Empok Nor

[Captain Seafort]

Pirates/Slavers/or assorted criminals

Which we have problems with now, and even in the Niger Delta or off the Horn of Africa civilian instillations don't get military grade weapons.

Asteroids

Which can be seen coming several years in advance, even with modern technology.

Random "things" that seem to pop up out of no where (such as whale probes, doomsday machines, and such)

Which occur once in a blue moon, and tend to steamroller anything that isn't called Enterprise in any event.

Valuble research could be coveted by hostile powers

Hence Starfleet - specifically the Reliant in Regula 1's case

[Mikey]

I have to agree with Seafort - you can't just assume that civilian facilities are all going to get militarized because of the slight possibility of problems. That list of possible issues Mark posted is potentially valid, but as Seafort mentioned about Regula 1, we're talking about the unarmed facilities being well inside uncontested Federation territory. Do you think a lot of piracy goes on in the heart of the UFP?

[Mark]

Seafort wrote:
Which we have problems with now, and even in the Niger Delta or off the Horn of Africa civilian instillations don't get military grade weapons.

Not a very valid comparison as the political situation between that of today and and that of Trek is significantly different. We've SEEN civilian craft with weapons in Trek. By no means am I suggesting putting QTs on a Regula type station, but the inharant problems of defending a stationary object almost demand a defense system as a station doesn't HAVE a "fight or flight" option.

Which can be seen coming several years in advance, even with modern technology.

I'll concede that. I should have used a broader term, such as "foreign space bodies" perhaps. However, again this is in the Trek universe and these things DO crop up unexpectedly.

Which occur once in a blue moon, and tend to steamroller anything that isn't called Enterprise in any event.

Or Deep Space Nine, or Voyager But seriously, things HAPPEN in space. When your a lone and stationary base your options are limited.

Hence Starfleet - specifically the Reliant in Regula 1's case

Which would have been great, if THAT was Reliant's mission. Reliant was there to search out a planet for the phase 3 experiment. Plus, how often do we see a ship respond to a distress signal in time to do anything aside from pick up the pieces or try to catch the bad guys?

Mikey wrote:
I have to agree with Seafort - you can't just assume that civilian facilities are all going to get militarized because of the slight possibility of problems. That list of possible issues Mark posted is potentially valid, but as Seafort mentioned about Regula 1, we're talking about the unarmed facilities being well inside uncontested Federation territory. Do you think a lot of piracy goes on in the heart of the UFP?

[/quote]

I'm not suggesting they militarize every civilian facility, BUT wouldn't you say that SOME sort of defense is in order? We've SEEN Pirates and Mercs operate inside Federation space before (as well in space "protected" by the Federation in regards to Bajor).

Here's an example....space staion DITL-1 is in the givashit system, orbiting givashit three, where they are mining wigits. Now, Captain Bligh of the Pirate Ship Jolly Roger decides that the DITL-1 is an easy mark. They want all the wigits they've mined, as well as slaves for the Orions and whatever other booty they can find. They move in and attack. Common sense would indicate the first thing they would do is jam the stations transmissions so they can't call for help. Now, the DITL-1 can't run OR call for help (assuming help is less than several days away). Unless the station has weapons, the Jolly Roger can sit back and keep shooting till they overwhelm the stations shields. From there it's not that big a challange to just TAKE what they want with the threat of detroying the station. Once the take what they want, they destroy the station anyway so they CAN'T tell starfleet whats going on.

Now do you see why weapons on a station would be needed?

[Tsukiyumi]

If they can put phasers on a shuttle, they can put phasers on a station. Logically, anyways.

[USSEnterprise]

Valuble research could be coveted by hostile powers

Hence Starfleet - specifically the Reliant in Regula 1's case

Wouldn't you want to be able to deal with a problem without having to call for help? Space is a big place, and the last thing you would want would be stuck in a situation, helpless. You don't need to make the station a fortress to take on the Klingon's or Romulan's, but enough to deal with small time raiders or smaller powers.

[Captain Seafort]

Not a very valid comparison as the political situation between that of today and and that of Trek is significantly different.

How?

We've SEEN civilian craft with weapons in Trek.

When?

the inharant problems of defending a stationary object almost demand a defense system as a station doesn't HAVE a "fight or flight" option.

Neither do the Niger oil platforms or shipping off the Horn.

Which would have been great, if THAT was Reliant's mission. Reliant was there to search out a planet for the phase 3 experiment.

Reliant was assigned as a general support vessel to Regula - the survey mission was simply what the Marcuses had set it off doing at the time.

I'm not suggesting they militarize every civilian facility, BUT wouldn't you say that SOME sort of defense is in order?

Those two statements are mutually exclusive - if you're arming the station you're militarising it.

*snip example*

Now do you see why weapons on a station would be needed?

Nope. Pirates are, fundamentally, businessmen - they're out to make a profit, and blowing up stations a) uses energy and b) pisses off Starfleet, making it more likely that they'd go after said pirates. The occasional attack, which going by what we've seen is very rare in the Federation, is far less of a risk than going round the Horn of Africa, or sitting on a Nigerian oil platform. Neither of these get military-grade weapons, so why should the far safer stations inside Fed space get them.

[Mikey]

We've SEEN Pirates and Mercs operate inside Federation space before

And try their damndest to stay under the radar. Attacking an installation isn't a way to do that, and if you're in Fed space, one should logically expect Starfleet's ships to be the main deterrent a/o prosecution of such acts.

as well in space "protected" by the Federation in regards to Bajor

As you allude to, Bajoran wasn't Fed territory, and as such wasn't in the UFP's jurisdiction. Also, not the same as what I mentioned - that's the Cardassian frontier, and recently contested, not buried well within Fed space as in the example I gave.

Here's an example....space staion DITL-1 is in the givashit system, orbiting givashit three, where they are mining wigits. Now, Captain Bligh of the Pirate Ship Jolly Roger decides that the DITL-1 is an easy mark. They want all the wigits they've mined, as well as slaves for the Orions and whatever other booty they can find. They move in and attack. Common sense would indicate the first thing they would do is jam the stations transmissions so they can't call for help. Now, the DITL-1 can't run OR call for help (assuming help is less than several days away). Unless the station has weapons, the Jolly Roger can sit back and keep shooting till they overwhelm the stations shields.

#1 - Is a Givashit Three on the frontier, or inside Fed space? If the latter, there's a good chance that the pirates wouldn't have been able to operate anyway. Remember, Starfleet would be policing its own space.

#2 - As mentioned above, good ol' Captain Bligh (that was HMS Bounty, BTW) would have been dead of his own stupidity long before if he went around attacking UFP installations.

#3 - In the way of thinking I gave, at least, a frontier station or one in an otherwise "assumed-risk" position operated by the UFP would be armed. If it's a civilian concern, let them take their chances - civilian operation have no business with mil-spec hardware.

[Coalition]

We've SEEN Pirates and Mercs operate inside Federation space before

And try their damndest to stay under the radar. Attacking an installation isn't a way to do that, and if you're in Fed space, one should logically expect Starfleet's ships to be the main deterrent a/o prosecution of such acts.

Not even that. Look up Suddenly Human, where a bordering race attacked, wiped out most of a colony, and kidnapped at least one of the kids. The Captain in charge of that raid made the kid his own son.

I'm sorry, but as one of the primary powers in the Alpha Quadrant talking to an alien-of-the-week; if you have a Captain who attacks one of my colonies, kills everyone there (as far as I can tell), and then leaves, you can expect a reply. That reply will be along the lines of a battle fleet, seizure of various space-based resources, and heavier patrols with orders to stop and inspect any of your vessels that get within 2 light years of any of my colonies. This is if I am feeling nice and you cooperate. Cooperation will be along the lines of handing over the Captain responsible (or his remains), payents to represent the losses from the colony (plus damages), and treaties to make sure it never happens again.

If the annoying neighbor insists that raiding other planets, killing everyone there, and kidnapping kids is part of their culture, I will introduce them to a part of my culture that says, "Never Again".


Other times that a starship wasn't close enough:
11001001 - Ent-D gets kidnapped by the Bynars, and the closest Starship is 3 days away. Given the strategic importance of the Bynars (they are the only ones who understand the modern Federation computers), there should be more protection.
Emissary - The only form of transportation for the Emissary from the starbase was a class 8 probe. No starships were available.
Survivors - a colony was attacked, and the closest starship was again 3 days away

[Captain Seafort]

Not even that. Look up Suddenly Human, where a bordering race attacked, wiped out most of a colony, and kidnapped at least one of the kids. The Captain in charge of that raid made the kid his own son.

Different situation - that wasn't a pirate raid, it was in the middle of a war. The Feds were probably unable to cover the colony because of more pressing concerns (covering C3I centres, escorting convoys, launching counter-attacks, etc).

11001001 - Ent-D gets kidnapped by the Bynars, and the closest Starship is 3 days away. Given the strategic importance of the Bynars (they are the only ones who understand the modern Federation computers), there should be more protection.
Emissary - The only form of transportation for the Emissary from the starbase was a class 8 probe. No starships were available.
Survivors - a colony was attacked, and the closest starship was again 3 days away

These are all planets, not stations - have we ever seen a Trek power deploy a surface-to-orbit weapons system? As for the issue of starships, their numbers are limited, and probably deployed either on deep-exploration missions or on the borders. Don't forget that this is the fleet that's so badly stretched that it takes 4-5 days to muster a few dozen ships on Earth's doorstep.

[stitch626]

Actuaslly, in the Bynar episode, the statement was that the closest ship was 3 days from the station that the E-D had docked at... no idea what that has to do with them having weapons.

[Coalition]

Actuaslly, in the Bynar episode, the statement was that the closest ship was 3 days from the station that the E-D had docked at... no idea what that has to do with them having weapons.

Basically there was nothing available to help chase the Ent-D when it was stolen. That tells how rare ships are for major installations in the Federation (which personally, should have some sort of armed craft for at least the asteroid patrol). With the Bynars though, I'd wonder if they altered the schedule so that no ships were available at that critical time.

Suddenly Human

Different situation - that wasn't a pirate raid, it was in the middle of a war. The Feds were probably unable to cover the colony because of more pressing concerns (covering C3I centres, escorting convoys, launching counter-attacks, etc).

The Federation was fighting a major war against an alien-of-the-week? From the episode, their anti-shipping weaponry was pathetic compared to a Galaxy class. Their main offensive ability was guerrilla warfare.

11001001 - Ent-D gets kidnapped by the Bynars, and the closest Starship is 3 days away. Given the strategic importance of the Bynars (they are the only ones who understand the modern Federation computers), there should be more protection.
Emissary - The only form of transportation for the Emissary from the starbase was a class 8 probe. No starships were available.
Survivors - a colony was attacked, and the closest starship was again 3 days away

These are all planets, not stations - have we ever seen a Trek power deploy a surface-to-orbit weapons system? As for the issue of starships, their numbers are limited, and probably deployed either on deep-exploration missions or on the borders. Don't forget that this is the fleet that's so badly stretched that it takes 4-5 days to muster a few dozen ships on Earth's doorstep.

All that is saying is that the Federation is overstretched and weak. A proper alien-of-the-week would trade with the Ferengi to get its tech up to date, then carve out a few small systems in the Federation. Hold those, and deal with the Federation counterattack. Eventually the aliens would want a treaty deeding them those few planets, where the aliens are responsible for defense, in exchange for production. Trade deals would go through as well, so the Federation doesn't lose out too much.

Of course, a few years later, after the aliens beat off the two hundredth pirate attack, is when they understand why the Federation representative was snickering when the Federation handed over defense duties for the planets. If the aliens retreat in the face of the pirates, they void the deal and lose the planets. If they continue to hold, they take steady losses. The Federation wins either way. This is how I'd see the Federation fighting wars against aliens-of-the-week. (From the Chtorr books, "What if we only pretended to lose?")

[Mark]

Seafort wrote:
How?

For one, today our military is quite different from civilian enterprises. In Trek, we've seen them use Starships as civillian research vessels, and Starfleet outposts commanded by civillians. They seem to mix and match as needed. Plus, the Federation is the primary dominant goverment within it's sphere of influence, where as nations today are bickering quite a bit.

When?

Seriously? There was the Maywether family ship in ENT (we saw them fight off the Nausicans), the Mercs/Pirates Picard and Riker went undercover with, and the ENTIRE MAQUIS fleet.

Neither do the Niger oil platforms or shipping off the Horn.

Granted, pirates don't ALWAYS attack and they rarely attack in high traffic places. However, when pirates DO attack they usually end up winning the fight. Then the military has to go in and rescue the hostages. I'm not suggesting that pirates would go after a research outpost in the Terran or Vulcan system. However, if some pirates would have gone after the Regula station instead of Khan and the Reliant, how quickly could help have arrived? The pirates would have been long gone, and in space there are a lot more places to hide.

Reliant was assigned as a general support vessel to Regula - the survey mission was simply what the Marcuses had set it off doing at the time.

Forgive me if I take this wrong, but it seems your suggesting that survey and exploration for a ship BUILT for survey and exploration would be a secondary mission??? If they were going to be given a ship for defense, wouldn't a frigate or destroyer assigned to the system be more appropriate? Because it sure looked to me like Regula was defenseless with Relient gone.

Those two statements are mutually exclusive - if you're arming the station you're militarising it.

Hardly. As I pointed out above, we've SEEN civilian ships with weapons. Saying that you can arm civilian ships but not stations seems a bit silly.

Nope. Pirates are, fundamentally, businessmen - they're out to make a profit, and blowing up stations a) uses energy and b) pisses off Starfleet, making it more likely that they'd go after said pirates. The occasional attack, which going by what we've seen is very rare in the Federation, is far less of a risk than going round the Horn of Africa, or sitting on a Nigerian oil platform. Neither of these get military-grade weapons, so why should the far safer stations inside Fed space get them.

We've seen the Ferengi go after Starfleet property more than once, and I haven't seen most of them brought to justice. The Maquis used to raid shipping, but Starfleet response was minimal. And the Orions grab whatever they can from whoever they can if they think they can get away with it. So I'm not thinking that pirates would be OVERLY worried about it, especially with Starfleets ongoing shortage of ships (no ships in the quadrant statements requiring DAYS of response time)

Mikey wrote:
#1 - Is a Givashit Three on the frontier, or inside Fed space? If the latter, there's a good chance that the pirates wouldn't have been able to operate anyway. Remember, Starfleet would be policing its own space.

#2 - As mentioned above, good ol' Captain Bligh (that was HMS Bounty, BTW) would have been dead of his own stupidity long before if he went around attacking UFP installations.

#3 - In the way of thinking I gave, at least, a frontier station or one in an otherwise "assumed-risk" position operated by the UFP would be armed. If it's a civilian concern, let them take their chances - civilian operation have no business with mil-spec hardware.

I mixed up the names on purpose for a laugh

And perhaps I should have been more specific. I'm not saying you'd arm say, Jupiter Station in the Terran system by any means, or a station in a well populated and defended system. What I'm saying is those lone stations where help is at best days away.

However, we've SEEN civilians with mil-spec hardware. SS Vico (an Oberth class ship) was in service as a civilian ship after all.

[Tsukiyumi]

I'm with Mark on this one. See my earlier statement:

If they can put phasers on a shuttle, they can put phasers on a station. Logically, anyways.

There you go.

[Mikey]

Here's the issue -

we've SEEN civilian ships with weapons.

I sure as hell haven't. I don't recall seeing the Vico fire, leading one to believe it was demilitarized before entering civilian service (which would make sense.) Anything else you're describing is a mercenary or pirate, which empatically =/= civilian.

As far as what "could" be done technologically: if someone could put a Vickers gun on a 1911-vintage Spad 13, I could put one on my Hyundai. Doesn't mean I'd get very far without getting a few police-issue 12-gauge rounds through my windshield.

[Captain Seafort]

For one, today our military is quite different from civilian enterprises. In Trek, we've seen them use Starships as civillian research vessels, and Starfleet outposts commanded by civillians. They seem to mix and match as needed.

Which is relevant to the Alpha Quadrant political situation you were talking about...how, exactly?

Plus, the Federation is the primary dominant goverment within it's sphere of influence, where as nations today are bickering quite a bit.

And the the US has dominance within it's sphere of influence that makes the UFP look pathetic.

There was the Maywether family ship in ENT (we saw them fight off the Nausicans)

Haven't seen the ep, but that was centuries ago.

the Mercs/Pirates Picard and Riker went undercover with, and the ENTIRE MAQUIS fleet.

Pirates and terrorists are armed. What a surprise

Granted, pirates don't ALWAYS attack and they rarely attack in high traffic places. However, when pirates DO attack they usually end up winning the fight. Then the military has to go in and rescue the hostages.

If they can find them - the Niger Delta in particular is an easy place to hide captives.

However, if some pirates would have gone after the Regula station instead of Khan and the Reliant, how quickly could help have arrived? The pirates would have been long gone, and in space there are a lot more places to hide.

In that case, help would have arrived very quickly, in the form of the Reliant. More generally, pirates aren't defeated by guarding ships and responding to specific incidents, but by going after their bases, which would be a lot easier to find - warp-driven ships tend to show up well on sensors, and finding a base would be a fairly simply matter of scouting un- or lightly -inhabited systems in the affected area.

Forgive me if I take this wrong, but it seems your suggesting that survey and exploration for a ship BUILT for survey and exploration would be a secondary mission??? If they were going to be given a ship for defense, wouldn't a frigate or destroyer assigned to the system be more appropriate? Because it sure looked to me like Regula was defenseless with Relient gone.

I'm suggesting that the Reliant was there as a jack of all trades to do whatever the Marcuses wanted done that Regula itself couldn't accomplish. Defence of the system was only one of those tasks.

Hardly. As I pointed out above, we've SEEN civilian ships with weapons. Saying that you can arm civilian ships but not stations seems a bit silly.

See mine and Mikey's response to that claim.

We've seen the Ferengi go after Starfleet property more than once, and I haven't seen most of them brought to justice.

Because they're more privateers than pirates, and therefore almost certainly under the protection of the Ferengi government. The Feds don't want to risk a war.

The Maquis used to raid shipping, but Starfleet response was minimal.

Other than setting major ambushes and conducting biological warfare.

And the Orions grab whatever they can from whoever they can if they think they can get away with it.

Not as much of a problem as the Ferengi, but again we're talking about state-sponsored privateers rather than pirates.

So I'm not thinking that pirates would be OVERLY worried about it, especially with Starfleets ongoing shortage of ships (no ships in the quadrant statements requiring DAYS of response time)

Nonetheless, once Starfleet does respond its got the mobility and firepower to crush any minor pirate base - the only ones who stand a chance are those with state support, and even they've never been observed attacking a manned outpost.