Bildo-
The problem with your scenerio is that Enterprise is a capitol ship, a heavy cruiser, one of only 12 at the time of the TV show. We never see carriers or battleships in Trek at all ( outside of the novels ). Kirk wasn’t a junior officer, he was (theoretically) one of the 12 most qualified people in Starfleet not in the Admiralty.
In TOS the colors denoted job assignments: Red-Ship’s services, Blue-Sciences and Gold-( actually green but they showed up as gold on TV) Command. By the time of the movies, the color scheme is still there, but much muted. The colors are on flashes on the TMP “pajama” uniforms and the color of the turtleneck worn under the red jackets for the rest of the movies.
Vandal, in the Original Series, yellow denoted command track officers, red was for security and engineering personel, and blue was for general sciences and medical.
In TNG, yellow and red switched and blue stayed the same.
Sometime after that, blue somehow transformed into green but still meant the same thing.
Nitpick - the movies show the Excelsior dreadnaughts - but they were just being developed. In the time of the TV series, the Constitution-class cruisers are the big boys on the block. Heck, when they tested the M-5 unit under battle conditions, you’d want to see it against the stuff that would be fighting - and they were all *Constitution-*class. I think they also have referred to *Enterprise * as the flagship of the Federation.
Interesting aside - in the threads about the *Yamato * and Bismarck they frequently refer to British ships as heavy cruisers or battle cruisers rather than battleships. Apparently the 3 schools of building them balance out speed, armor, and armaments. AT least early in WWII the British had quick ships, heavily armed, not so heavily armored. The Germans also had good speed, heavy armor (turns out the * Bismarck * was apparently scuttled - the belt armor never was breached, though the guns, electronics, etc were destroyed) but less powerful guns. The Americans had powerful guns and heavy armor - but were the slowest of the three. The *Bismarck vs. Yamato * thread was quite good.
First of all, I freely admit that I’m basically talking out of my butt here, but anyway:
As I see it, the costumes and rank insignia of the original series were designed at the time of the pilot/first episode. I don’t know the real history of the show, but I’m guessing that in the time prior to the first season the thinking about the details of Starfleet was pretty damn rudimentary, other than the knowledge that it was the organization that sponsored the Enterprise.
It seems to me that Roddenberry’s original idea was to have the Enterprise to be a scout ship on a five year mission “to boldly go where no man has gone before” (to famously split an infinitive). Consistent with that, the second-in-command was the science officer, with the next most important being the medical officer.
Lieutenant Cook, commander of the Endeavor was known as one of the most experienced and qualified young navigators and cartographers in the Royal Navy when he went on his expedition. Likewise, command of a scout ship on an exploration mission facing unkown dangers would be a highly appropriate and prestigous mission for a highly-regarded mid-level officer. Kirk was a rising superstar of Starfleet (and a bit of a lone wolf), but not initially the sort of person who would be in command of a major warship at that stage of his career. In fact, much of Kirk’s persona is his brashness and willingness to take risks.
Picard’s Enterprise, on the other hand, is much more of a capital warship on military and diplomatic missions, and Picard is much more the experienced senior commander type.
I agree. There were a couple of episodes (Yesterday’s Enterprise, for sure) that Picard outright called the Enterprise a Battleship.
More diplomatic, yes. More military, no. No military man would have that twerp Weasley Crusher or a “counselor” with her boobs hanging out on the bridge.
Actually, Riker seemed more the military man.
And Kirk has the largest, most heavily armed class of ship in Starfleet. And Mc Coy was not third in command, Scotty was.
AFAICR, Excelsior was never refered to as a dreadnaught-it was the new heavy cruiser class designed to replace ships like Enterprise
And Kirk’s mission was far more then one of exploration. He was a spy (The Enterprise Incident), a diplomat (A Taste of Armageddon,The Gamesters of Triskelion) and a soldier ( Balance of Terror, Arena, Court Martial, Errand of Mercy) among other things. I OTOH, am aparently an enormous geek.
Correction: one black circle was the ad hoc “enlisted” insignia; Ensigns wore one silver circle. Junior grade lieutenants (Geordi & Worf in season 1) had one silver circle and one black circle.
I’m sure this will come as a great shock to the Navy aviators who are, and always have been, part of the space program. Alan Shepard, for starters.
Not as big as I am, it would seem. “The Gamesters of Triskelion” began as a routine survey mission. Perhaps you meant “Spectre of the Gun,” in which Kirk was ordered to open relations with the Melkots, a la Commodore Perry in Japan.
Spectre of the Gun fits as well, I wan’t trying to list every episode that fit each example.
Yeah, in Yesterday’s Enterprise Picard referred to the ship as a battleship, but in an alternate future where the Federation was at war with the Klingons. In that alternate future there where no children or families on the ship is in the “actual” Star Trek reality. I’ve never heard Picard refer to the Enterprise D as anything other than an exploritory vessel.
Don’t forget rescue and assistance calls! All the incarnations of Trek use SOS calls to drive the plot. Consider these few examples from TOS: “Operation: Annihilate”, “The Immunity Syndrome”, “The Doomsday Machine”, “Balance of Terror”, etc…
The chief medical officer had some influence over the mission, as far as crew fitness- including relieving the Captain; which was demonstrated many times. Although he (or she or the EMH) wasn’t in the direct chain of command they had the authority necessary to take action on behalf of the Federation in medical matters.
With this in mind, Kirk’s job was divided between military missions, exploration, and services to the Federation (beyond military help.)
Roddenberry, according to “The Making of Star Trek”, pitched his idea to the networks as “Horatio Hornblower in Space” and “Wagon Train to the Stars”; he was using the independent captain and crew idea and the sense of community in unknown lands concept from Wagon Train as his pitching points to the programmers.
The weakest point in the Star Trek universe is the continuity. At the beginning, the very process that creates the show makes it difficult to stay within its own canon; rewrites and financial considerations can cause major changes to concepts. When you add different people to the mix, as in new writers, directors, and producers, changes will be made that make no sense in the context of the show but make perfect sense to the producer trying to stay under budget. Without someone devoted to the job of continuity, like a single author (Stracyzinski and Babylon 5 comes to mind) it’s almost impossible to be completely coherent.
I believe that they started out with a simple rank system and it has changed so much that it’s basically inconsistent.