Would Starfleet still be Starfleet if they had marines?

[Adam Reynolds]

While it is fairly obvious that Starfleet's lack of dedicated ground combat units is a strategic weakness, what I have recently been considering is whether it is possible to have Starfleet or a Starfleet-like group that are also a proper functioning military that are fully equipped. Would Starfleet lose the sense of being an optimistic quasi-military if they had prudent weapons, equipment, doctrine, and training for fighting a war when it became necessary?

Or to put it another way, is the fact that a modern American small town SWAT team is better armed and equipped than a Star Trek away team who are doing commando raids a worse critique of American police militarization or is it a worse critique of Starfleet?

[bilateralrope]

Starfleet's ground forces don't seem any less equipped than most of the foes they deal with. So that makes me think of two possibilities:
- Everyone has figured out that whatever extra equipment you're thinking of isn't actually useful for reasons that aren't clear to us.
- If Starfleet deploys extra equipment and it's useful, everyone else will copy them. An escalation that Starfleet doesn't want.

What kind of equipment are you thinking of for general use ?

[Adam Reynolds]

Starfleet's ground forces don't seem any less equipped than most of the foes they deal with. So that makes me think of two possibilities:
- Everyone has figured out that whatever extra equipment you're thinking of isn't actually useful for reasons that aren't clear to us.
- If Starfleet deploys extra equipment and it's useful, everyone else will copy them. An escalation that Starfleet doesn't want.

What kind of equipment are you thinking of for general use ?

Sure it really is an out of universe writing problem, but it is obvious that Starfleet is not fully equipped. See the Ground Combat pages on the main site or some of Brian Young's videos on the subject.

They really need proper environmental protection, body armor and a more concealable outfit, as well more ergonomic weapons and grenades. Ideally some basic survival gear and ground vehicles would also be nice for times when transporters or shuttles are less of an option, mainly for long term reconnaissance and peacetime survey work. What would really be cool is a Subnautica style replicator that would allow the construction of useful tools with a localized supply of resources for Away Teams.

While it is true that other militaries are not particularly well equipped either, it also seems to be the case that they don't consider Starfleet Security to be much of a threat in land warfare. The Romulans thought that they could take Vulcan with only a few thousand soldiers while Klingons were the primary assault element in the Dominion War. Starfleet Engineers were legendary for their ability to turn rocks into replicators. What were Starfleet Security officers legendary for?

[bilateralrope]

The Romulans thought that they could take Vulcan with only a few thousand soldiers

We are talking a planet that likely uses transporters for moving almost everything. Likely a centralized system because you don't want random people teleporting to whatever location they feel like (eg, inside your home). Take control of that and any invader has taken control over the movement of food, people, etc across the entire planet. So any invader just needs enough troops to overwhelm whatever defenses are close to the transporter control hub(s). Then have orbital support watching for anyone attempting to fly/drive in forces from elsewhere on the planet.

They really need proper environmental protection, body armor and a more concealable outfit, as well more ergonomic weapons and grenades.

I'll grant you that they should break out the environmental protection and survival gear more and that more ergonomic weapons seem useful.

Body armor is questionable. Nobody uses it, so I have to wonder if it's possible to make body armor that's useful against Trek ground weapons without some other major downside.

Grenades could be useful in specific missions. But not something routinely carried, both for the message they send when carried by people on peaceful missions and the danger high explosives cause to everyone if used about a starship. Also the issue of klingons learning about grenades and using them to avoid the dishonor of being captured.

Others knowing about regular deployment of concealable military gear could cause diplomatic issues because its existence makes it harder for random aliens to be sure that the Starfleet personnel standing in front of them and claiming to be unarmed really are unarmed.

ground vehicles would also be nice for times when transporters or shuttles are less of an option, mainly for long term reconnaissance and peacetime survey work

How often do Starfleet take part in those long term missions without having access to a transporter ?

If they have a shuttlecraft, they have transporters. Unless something about the planet blocks them.

[Ralin]

Body armor is questionable. Nobody uses it, so I have to wonder if it's possible to make body armor that's useful against Trek ground weapons without some other major downside.

Was thinking about yesterday. Maybe it's not possible to come up with phaser/disrupter-resistant armor using Federation technology. I'll buy that. But bullets/shrapnel/knives/thrown rocks/skinned knees still exist. There's no reason to assume some bright Cardassian or whatever jackass isn't going to break out assault rifles that fire physical bullets in some future fight, even without getting into all the new aliens Starfleet ships come into contact with. The Klingons actively sought out chances to use bladed weapons in close combat. There's all sorts of other things body armor could be used to protect against.

Honestly they could have just said that the Federation makes their uniforms out of super tough and resistant future material and I'd have rolled with it. But far as I know, they didn't.

Others knowing about regular deployment of concealable military gear could cause diplomatic issues because its existence makes it harder for random aliens to be sure that the Starfleet personnel standing in front of them and claiming to be unarmed really are unarmed.

I think he was talking more about the very visible primary color uniforms they wear.

We are talking a planet that likely uses transporters for moving almost everything. Likely a centralized system because you don't want random people teleporting to whatever location they feel like (eg, inside your home). Take control of that and any invader has taken control over the movement of food, people, etc across the entire planet. So any invader just needs enough troops to overwhelm whatever defenses are close to the transporter control hub(s). Then have orbital support watching for anyone attempting to fly/drive in forces from elsewhere on the planet.

Yeah, I can see a lot of reasons why small armies would be the order of the day. But by the same token those armies should be as skilled and well-equipped as possible.

[bilateralrope]

I'll buy that. But bullets/shrapnel/knives/thrown rocks/skinned knees still exist. There's no reason to assume some bright Cardassian or whatever jackass isn't going to break out assault rifles that fire physical bullets in some future fight, even without getting into all the new aliens Starfleet ships come into contact with. The Klingons actively sought out chances to use bladed weapons in close combat. There's all sorts of other things body armor could be used to protect against.

Fair point about shrapnel, knives, etc.

As for guns firing physical bullets, that seems to be a major cultural blindspot for everyone. Even when facing the borg, who can't adapt to kinetics, nobody thinks of replicating a few bullet weapons. We know the Federation has the replicator pattern for at least one. Since it's a weapon that nobody uses once they get handheld energy weapons, armor that can stop bullets won't be worth the weight. Not until after someone starts using bullets.

Low tech civilizations still use bullets. But visible body armor conflicts with the message of "we come in peace" and I doubt Starfleet will be getting into many ground conflicts with low tech civilizations. Just short, unexpected, fights until the Starfleet personnel can be extracted.

I think he was talking more about the very visible primary color uniforms they wear.

Maybe. But the style there keeps changing for some reason.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Something approximating body armour (or at least protective clothing for security situations) is seen being worn in several of the TOS films, and small arms phasers don't seem to be much more potent in the TNG era as compared to TOS, so I suspect that whole "starfleet is not a military organisation" thing Picard spouted got rid of it.

By the time they're fighting the Borg, well they don't seem to use ranged weapons at all (except for Lore's bunch) so armour isn't needed and might actively be a hindrance. When the Jem'Hadar come along, again, its possible they looked at the weapons they used and concluded that any armour sufficient to protect people would be heavy enough to slow them down and make them easier to hit in the first place.

[Ralin]

I gotta figure Federation technology is capable of creating protective clothing that doesn't scream 'armor' but still defends against a wide variety of threats. Even when the weapons in play are phasers and disrupters, there's still things like shrapnel from things being blown up nearby to worry about. And scrapes and bruises from dodging.

Really I think it boils down to them assuming at least 9/10ths of what matters in any given conflict is space supremacy.

[Adam Reynolds]

Others knowing about regular deployment of concealable military gear could cause diplomatic issues because its existence makes it harder for random aliens to be sure that the Starfleet personnel standing in front of them and claiming to be unarmed really are unarmed.

This is not what I meant at all(I was referring to a lack of camouflage), but ironically Starfleet actually does do this given the existence of the Type 1 phaser.


In any case, what I'm really wondering here is more of a philosophical question. Would the existence of a better armed and equipped force make Starfleet feel less like Starfleet?

[Crazedwraith]

Facetiously if you want to go full 'Starfleet should be exactly like the US Navy to be realistic', then no. Because the Federation Marines would be entirely separate organisation from Starfleet anyway.

eta: Slightly less facetiously, yes if Star Trek devoted much more time to showing realistic ground combat and more money on costume, props and effects to depict it, it would be spending less time and money on things that Star Trek shows should 'actually' be about.

Take 'Siege of AR-558', it's a reasonably competent anti-war episode. Would it's story or message have been stronger if they had Federation Marines there will all the bells and whistles? I don't really think so, which is probably why they didn't spend that money there.

That said, Enterpise actually delves into this slightly with MACOs and Discovery gave them much more extensive combat and protective gear for away missions.

[Adam Reynolds]

Facetiously if you want to go full 'Starfleet should be exactly like the US Navy to be realistic', then no. Because the Federation Marines would be entirely separate organisation from Starfleet anyway.

What would actually be a more interesting model would be the US Air Force, who essentially have Security Forces and special operations units as their "infantry." So in that context what Starfleet really needs are rescue and support focused commandos like US Air Force Pararescue, combat controller, and special reconnaissance units, possibly also taking inspiration from US Army Special Forces who have other non-combat specialties in addition to their commando roles. The training and leadership model of Army Special Forces would also work nicely when they are embedded with larger Starfleet crews in which they could serve as the core of ground combat units supplemented with conventional Starfleet crews as needed. Army Special Forces being referred to as the peace corps with guns does oddly feel rather Starfleet-like as well.

In a Star Trek context special operations could also be more Mission Impossible than Black Hawk Down as they try and avoid violence except as a last resort. That's sort of true with real commandos as well, but it is less so than with Starfleet.

eta: Slightly less facetiously, yes if Star Trek devoted much more time to showing realistic ground combat and more money on costume, props and effects to depict it, it would be spending less time and money on things that Star Trek shows should 'actually' be about.

Take 'Siege of AR-558', it's a reasonably competent anti-war episode. Would it's story or message have been stronger if they had Federation Marines there will all the bells and whistles? I don't really think so, which is probably why they didn't spend that money there.

In a way I think it would have been better thematically, because you couldn't then argue that Starfleet would have been better off if they had machine guns or grenades. Getting distracted by arguments that their tactics or equipment sucked takes away from the anti-war themes. Contrast this with Star Wars in which the more realistic if often flawed tactics make the losses in a work like Rogue One even more tragic because there is not an obvious sense that the heroes could have done better given the lousy circumstances.

I realize that most of the problem is about budgets not being there for this sort of thing, but while that is a reasonable excuse, it doesn't really get rid of the problem.

That said, Enterpise actually delves into this slightly with MACOs and Discovery gave them much more extensive combat and protective gear for away missions.

I think the issue was that historically Star Trek didn't bother with much in the way of realism because this was simply the standards of the day. More recent series have had to get slightly more realistic because the standards have improved when contrasted with other shows like SG-1, BSG, or The Expanse.

The problem now is that so many of the unrealistic elements have just become worldbuilding at this point, which to me is the core of what really bugs me about Star Trek.This is also probably why I like Lower Decks more than any of the serious parts of the franchise lately, because they can just embrace absurd things like Kirk-fu being an effective fighting style or a lack of reasonable quarantine procedures or environmental protection gear leading to a zombie outbreak onboard the ship.

[Crazedwraith]

I feel like there's some logical fallacy/circular reasoning in 'they should have better ground combat equipment so i can stop complaining about the ground combat equipment'. Begging the question maybe? I don't believe they could have ever displayed it well enough that no-one could quibble about their equipment or the writing of the episodes. I'm also wondering how much of the audience is the kind that will complain and be distracted by it and how many will go along with the premise.

And since you mention SG-1 or BSG, non of them had particular standout ground fights either. They are better than Star Trek sure but they're not realistic. Like the pilot episode for SG-1, they take two teams, establish a perimeter with mines, shoot down a glider with a stinger missile.. and then never do it again for the rest of the series.

Combined arms, like mortars, missiles and anything much more fancy than 'shoot them with P90s' was very much a special occasion for the show and that was a show actually about the US Military that hired military advisors.

[Ralin]

I don't believe they could have ever displayed it well enough that no-one could quibble about their equipment or the writing of the episodes.

There's getting it perfect and there's getting it close enough that people aren't calling it obviously bad decades later. I think the latter is achievable.

And since you mention SG-1 or BSG, non of them had particular standout ground fights either. They are better than Star Trek sure but they're not realistic. Like the pilot episode for SG-1, they take two teams, establish a perimeter with mines, shoot down a glider with a stinger missile.. and then never do it again for the rest of the series.

Combined arms, like mortars, missiles and anything much more fancy than 'shoot them with P90s' was very much a special occasion for the show and that was a show actually about the US Military that hired military advisors.

Showing competence once makes it easier to assume they're being competent and professional off-screen in the future.

I'm also wondering how much of the audience is the kind that will complain and be distracted by it and how many will go along with the premise.

This is coming pretty close to the classic "It doesn't matter nerd, shut the fuck up" rebuttal. Which could be applied to most any criticism of the franchise.

[Crazedwraith]

It's just a statement of fact. If 99% of your audience isn't going to give a shit about it and it's going to cost you a significant chunk of your budget to do something about it. Then sorry to say, it's not worth it.

Now there are two assumptions there obviously. How much the audience cares, and how much it would cost to fix and I can't make any definite claims about either of them but it's part of the calculus the show runners would have to do.

It's certainly a fair point of view to say 'if you don't have the budget to do these horrors of war episodes right you shouldn't do them' but for myself I never thought any of them were hurt by lack of grenades, machinesguns and flak jackets and so on.

[Solauren]

The way Starfleet is set up, Security = Marines.

So, the question is, should Starfleet security have better equipment?

On ship; maybe a bit. After all, you shouldn't be using explosives in an enclosed environment like a starship. That could breach the hull and cause all sorts of problems.
A portable mini/force field like Worf had on the holodeck in one episode (A Fist Full of Datas) with a decent power source, however, would be a good idea.
A few proceedures for Intruder Alert would also be a good idea, but that's not related to equipment
(i.e Activating all internal force fields to contain everyone, using internal sensors to locate the intruders, letting everyone else out, and then dealing with the intruders).

For typical 'Away Missions' we see, the mini-force field would be useful. But most away missions are expected to be non-combat, so more isn't needed.
(Or - "We're hoping to diffuse the situation, so we don't want to appear like we want to fight", so more might be a bad idea.)

So, it gets down to "We are going into a combat situation" scenarios.

For that, yes, absolutely, Starfleet needs better equipment.
(You'd think with Star Trek's tech level, that could at least carry a sidearm similar to a Judge's Lawgiver from Judge Dredd or something.)

[Batman]

They already DO carry a sidearm similar to a lawgiver-the 19 million different phaser settings, remember? The one thing wrong with the TNG phaser is the 'ergonomics', functionally they're perfectly fine as a sidearm.

[Solauren]

They already DO carry a sidearm similar to a lawgiver-the 19 million different phaser settings, remember? The one thing wrong with the TNG phaser is the 'ergonomics', functionally they're perfectly fine as a sidearm.

I meant as in 'Signal Flare', "High-Ex", "Thermite", "EMP", etc. Shooting variable types of ammo, rather then 'Phaser Beam' on different settings.

[Ralin]

Which of those do you think a phaser can't do?

[Adam Reynolds]

Which of those do you think a phaser can't do?

Phasers can't easily replicate the effects of high explosive, thermite, or EMP effects directly. While phasers sometimes can do demolition work against targets like rock, they can't do so against hardened targets like metal. They also can't really do any direct EMP effect that we've seen. Their limited effectiveness against metal targets also means they would be harder to use against something like super battle droids from Star Wars (not that I mean to invoke the versus debate, I was just using it as an example).

The only one of those that phasers could probably replicate is a flare given the relative brightness of their beams. Though even in that case they would not be as effective as a dedicated flare that hangs in the air.

[bilateralrope]

Their limited effectiveness against metal targets also means they would be harder to use against something like super battle droids from Star Wars (not that I mean to invoke the versus debate, I was just using it as an example).

But nobody uses anything like a battle droid. The only AIs the Federation has been able to build that didn't go badly are holograms, and even they had some problems. I can't recall anyone who managed to do better.

There is no upside to taking a countermeasure to something that nobody uses. But there is the downside of the extra weight.

[Crazedwraith]

The Quark is a weapons dealer episode actually implied Cardassians had robots they used as mechanised infantry. Quark shows one as target while doing a demo on the holosuite and it was never seen again. (I guess because weapons dealers had a rifle sized weapon that could easily deal with them)

eta: Checking Memory Alpha I may have been misremembering. Garak mentions cardassian mechanised infantry in dialogue in different episode. The target Quark shows is probably a Dopterian Interceptor which is floaty drone thing. I swear I remember a mech thing with legs but apparently not.

[bilateralrope]

Yes, they exist. But they were never deployed in the Dominion War.

My best guess as to why would be that they were too easily hacked by Federation forces.

[Solauren]

Which of those do you think a phaser can't do?

Depends on the situation. We've seen situations where phasers don't work. Either due to environmental concerns (i.e the Class-H planet Data was on that the Shel'lac were going to colonize), or the nature of the opponent (Armus, The Borg). We even have canon dialogue that projectile weapons were being considered for situations phasers were not feasible (DS9 episode with the Vulcan serial killer using a transporter/rifle hybrid)

Also, phasers take time to do duplicate those effects, and might wreck the Phaser. You toss a Frag Grenade into a room, you're going to do alot of damage quicker then a phaser can without setting it to overload and tossing it (even then, it's got to build up the charge).
A ready to go EMP is quicker then reconfiguring a Phaser to go off like that, and doesn't have the power-up.

And again, I'm talking carrying that into 'we are going into combat' situations, not standard away missions.

[Batman]

Thing is, phasers ALWAYS have their flexibility. A lawgiver only has whatever ammunition is preloaded, and projectile weapons have limited magazine space.

[bilateralrope]

Which of those do you think a phaser can't do?

Depends on the situation. We've seen situations where phasers don't work. Either due to environmental concerns (i.e the Class-H planet Data was on that the Shel'lac were going to colonize), or the nature of the opponent (Armus, The Borg). We even have canon dialogue that projectile weapons were being considered for situations phasers were not feasible (DS9 episode with the Vulcan serial killer using a transporter/rifle hybrid)

Those would justify a loadout specific to that situation, but I'm not sure they are common enough to modify the standard loadout. Or the standard combat loadout.

The dialog about the transporter rifle also mentions that Starfleet abandoned it because they got phasers working in those conditions. So not the best example.