Court Martial over the loss of Enterprise-D

[Baffalo]

I have to wonder, given the series of bad decisions seen in Generations, surely someone's ass would have been canned for the loss of the Enterprise-D. Picard was emotionally compromised and should have given up command, Riker was almost criminally inept with his handling of the Enterprise in combat, Troi, well, we remember how well she piloted... and any time they lose a ship, there's a court martial. What would be the list of charges, and how did anyone avoid losing their jobs? (other than the production saying they couldn't split up the cast for obvious reasons).

[Alferd Packer]

The only thing I can think of is that the investigation discovered the tampering with Geordi's VISOR, and that was enough of a mitigating circumstance.

Or there was way more damage to the big E in the opening salvo that was indicated, and this fact was discovered in the sensor logs. Like she could only fire phasers at 25% strength or something, and her torpedo launchers were similarly damaged.

I mean, you've got to jump through some pretty big hoops to reach what we were shown in the films, so pretty much any hypothesis is worth considering.

[Eternal_Freedom]

If things happened exactly as seen in the film (ignoring any "initial damage was far higher than thought" line of reasoning) I can see a few charges appearing:

1. Picard, for being criminally dumb enough to beam down to the surface rather than remain in command, and for not relinquishing command whilst emotionally compromised (as already mentioned).
2. Riker, for gross incompetence in not simply blasting the BoP to dust.
3. Worf and Data for gross incompetence for not suggesting they open fire with everything they have, 4. La Forge, for gross incompetence for not change the shield frequencies (apparently a common practice after engagements with the Borg, witness the radio chatter talking about "remodulating shield protection" etc)

Honestly, the point about Worf really bugs me. This is the man whose first answer to a potentially hostile or unknown ship has been "arm weapons and open fire" through most of the series, has a personal grudge against the Duras sisters and is generally happy to blow something up. He doesn't say "we should destroy them," he doesn't even do it himself despite being the guy in control of the guns. Even if Riker didn't order him to do it, destroying an attacking vessel is quite reasonable.

There was a book, "The Return" that dealt with this, Picard fully expected to be court-martialled for it (as he had over the loss of the Stargazer, only for it to be brushed aside in orer to avoid admitting the Galaxy class was a deeply flawed design. "Ship of the Line" brought up this angle as well IIRC; the E-E was already nearing completion so Starfleet was happy to just bury it and send Picard off on another mission.

[Lord Revan]

we should remember when the loss of the Enterprise (NCC-1701-D) happend, it would have happend either during the Marquis crisis or during the prelude to the Dominion war (possibly during the Klingon-cardasian war the federation got dragged into) so it's not impossible to think that Starfleet thought that it would better to keep someone as experienced as Picard and his command crew then to "hang" them for a single incident.

[Patroklos]

Is also more likely that with both of those military threats on the horizon having one of the Federations most powerful starships lost through stupidity is worth a hanging.

[Prometheus Unbound]

1. Picard, for being criminally dumb enough to beam down to the surface rather than remain in command, and for not relinquishing command whilst emotionally compromised (as already mentioned).

"Then I will beam to your ship, and you can beam me to Soren"

He apparently went to the Klingon ship first. Although he appeared with a starfleet beam SFX rather than Klingon. If he did actually go to the BoP, I'm astounded Lursa and Be'Tor actually kept their word.

[Prometheus Unbound]

1. Picard, for being criminally dumb enough to beam down to the surface rather than remain in command, and for not relinquishing command whilst emotionally compromised (as already mentioned).

"Then I will beam to your ship, and you can beam me to Soren"

He apparently went to the Klingon ship first. Although he appeared with a starfleet beam SFX rather than Klingon. If he did actually go to the BoP, I'm astounded Lursa and Be'Tor actually kept their word.

3. Worf and Data for gross incompetence for not suggesting they open fire with everything they have, 4. La Forge, for gross incompetence for not change the shield frequencies (apparently a common practice after engagements with the Borg, witness the radio chatter talking about "remodulating shield protection" etc)

Well to be fair, even if he did (he may have ) they could see what he was doing. I think the point was that every time he did, they just switched frequencies. BUT that said, from what I've read in interviews, I think tbh they really didn't think of it - they don't seem to have given much of a shit with the script / story (as is evident). So I assume the writers were just dumb.

[Captain Seafort]

Well to be fair, even if he did (he may have ) they could see what he was doing. I think the point was that every time he did, they just switched frequencies. BUT that said, from what I've read in interviews, I think tbh they really didn't think of it - they don't seem to have given much of a shit with the script / story (as is evident). So I assume the writers were just dumb.

I've heard the opposite - that they either wrote or filmed exactly that scene, but it was cut (for length or because it's so obvious that it's unnecessary I don't recall).

[Patroklos]

I forget, but why didn't the Enterprise just turn Soran's launch site into molten rock with a few phase blasts? He is about to murder 230,000,000 sentient beings not to mention destroy an M-class planet and its entire system (which I regard as a worse crime). Why they hell should you feel compelled to find a diplomatic solution to that?

Oh yeah, the IONOSPHERE caused interference. Fuck you writers. Well guess what? You know that view screen that can enhance starship visuals to perfect resolution from billions of miles away and that computer that can process trillions of cubic miles of volumetric sensor readings instantaneously? Visually find the damn launch site. Its interesting that they can beam through that Ionosphere...

Also, why are we supposed to believe that a transmitted video signal from LaForge's visor would not be detected by the Enterprise in the first place?

[Borgholio]

Also, why are we supposed to believe that a transmitted video signal from LaForge's visor would not be detected by the Enterprise in the first place?

What I have always wondered is how they got it to transmit "normal" vision. In early episodes of TNG it was demonstrated how the world looks through Geordi's VISOR...and it resembles something out of Predator, not normal vision because it can't transmit normal vision.

[Patroklos]

I thought that was a trick of trying to make it visible to his human brain. Ie you couldn't just jack a video input into his head, what we saw was what was required to make that interface work.

But yeah, unless the Klingons had some readily available translation program its odd. Honestly its pretty clear the hack writers just forgot.

[DaveJB]

In fairness, that episode ("Heart of Glory") was written under a completely different creative team, years before Moore or Braga were ever involved with Star Trek. There's a lot of things in Generations you can blame them (and Berman) for, but that's probably not one of them.

I suppose it's possible that Soran put a self-contained camera and transmitter in Geordi's VISOR rather than tapping into its feed. Granted, that would require extreme stupidity on Dr. Crusher's part, but hey, she was certainly in good company that day. And it still makes more sense than Soran magically whipping up a perfectly stable link in a short while when the more advanced Enterprise computer had trouble maintaining signal cohesion with the VISOR.

As for why they didn't visually scan the planet to determine the launch site, that'd probably be limited by the speed of the person doing the scanning. Without knowing what the launch site looked like (and that Soran was kind enough to stick it atop a mountain rather than a small clearing in a forest or something similar), trying to get the computer to automatically scan the planet's surface would likely have thrown up too many false positives.

[Prometheus Unbound]

In fairness, that episode ("Heart of Glory") was written under a completely different creative team, years before Moore or Braga were ever involved with Star Trek. There's a lot of things in Generations you can blame them (and Berman) for, but that's probably not one of them.

I suppose it's possible that Soran put a self-contained camera and transmitter in Geordi's VISOR rather than tapping into its feed. Granted, that would require extreme stupidity on Dr. Crusher's part, but hey, she was certainly in good company that day. And it still makes more sense than Soran magically whipping up a perfectly stable link in a short while when the more advanced Enterprise computer had trouble maintaining signal cohesion with the VISOR.

As for why they didn't visually scan the planet to determine the launch site, that'd probably be limited by the speed of the person doing the scanning. Without knowing what the launch site looked like (and that Soran was kind enough to stick it atop a mountain rather than a small clearing in a forest or something similar), trying to get the computer to automatically scan the planet's surface would likely have thrown up too many false positives.

Scan for trilithium - there's the source

[Eternal_Freedom]

Hell, scan for any form of advanced technology, since the planet was stated to be uninhabited. Or humanoid lifesigns. Or whatever fuel source/engine that probe used to travel FTL to reach the star in eleven seconds.

[Batman]

That would, however, require the crew to be marginally competent. We already know they're not

[Nephtys]

I just realized. Assuming the distance to the star was 1 AU, that little peewee rocket traveled to it in 11 seconds... that's 63239c.

For reference, Warp 9.99 is (according to google), 7,912c.

That's one fast little goddard rocket.

[Batman]

Um-yeah, no. An AU is roughly 150 million kilometres, which is about 500 lightseconds so doing that in 11 seconds is roughly 45c. Still pretty impressive for a dinky little rocket but nowhere near what you came up with.

[Nephtys]

Um-yeah, no. An AU is roughly 150 million kilometres, which is about 500 lightseconds so doing that in 11 seconds is roughly 45c. Still pretty impressive for a dinky little rocket but nowhere near what you came up with.

You are correct. Whooooops.

[Patroklos]

As for why they didn't visually scan the planet to determine the launch site, that'd probably be limited by the speed of the person doing the scanning. Without knowing what the launch site looked like (and that Soran was kind enough to stick it atop a mountain rather than a small clearing in a forest or something similar), trying to get the computer to automatically scan the planet's surface would likely have thrown up too many false positives.

Why would you use a Mk1 eyeball? We already use computers to scan and notice visual occulting of stars to find things in our sky. No, put the ships computer on it. examining the surface of the planet down to the square centimeter in seconds would be child's play compared to what we see it do with sensor data in the series. Of course maybe this completely obvious and basic method of examining your surroundings is absent from their capabilities. Its not like visually examining their surroundings to find the supposedly hard to find has ever been useful in ST before...

As to the later posts about scans remember the IONOSPHERE(tm) blocked their sensors. That must suck not ever being able to scan Earth for any reason. Or pretty most planets with atmospheres.That's right, they couldn't even be bothered to come up with a technobable reason for it. I imagine a conversation like "Hey, I just realized it would be absurdly easy to prevent this plot device from happening, how can we prevent this? Something about the atmosphere maybe?" *searches for atmosphere on AOL* "Hmmmm, ozone layer? Nah I have heard about that before... Hey, what's this IONOSPHERE thing? That sounds kind of siency. Perfect!"

[DaveJB]

Why would you use a Mk1 eyeball? We already use computers to scan and notice visual occulting of stars to find things in our sky. No, put the ships computer on it. examining the surface of the planet down to the square centimeter in seconds would be child's play compared to what we see it do with sensor data in the series. Of course maybe this completely obvious and basic method of examining your surroundings is absent from their capabilities. Its not like visually examining their surroundings to find the supposedly hard to find has ever been useful in ST before...

All that assumes that the Enterprise computer is able to search the entire surface of a planet fast enough to pick up a vaguely defined target object. Unless Worf reacted to the request to scan the planet by immediately just saying "Nope. Can't be done." and then playing Tribble Hunter 2371 on his console, it seems likely that he was trying to scan the planet visually, but just not getting anywhere.

As to the later posts about scans remember the IONOSPHERE(tm) blocked their sensors. That must suck not ever being able to scan Earth for any reason. Or pretty most planets with atmospheres.That's right, they couldn't even be bothered to come up with a technobable reason for it. I imagine a conversation like "Hey, I just realized it would be absurdly easy to prevent this plot device from happening, how can we prevent this? Something about the atmosphere maybe?" *searches for atmosphere on AOL* "Hmmmm, ozone layer? Nah I have heard about that before... Hey, what's this IONOSPHERE thing? That sounds kind of siency. Perfect!"

I don't think the implication was that they were unable to scan the planet because it had an ionosphere, but rather that there was some weird element or energy in the ionosphere that was blocking the sensors. Still, it was a stupid explanation. I'm surprised the writers didn't just go with the obvious solution and establish that Soran had put sensor jamming devices on the planet and/or the Klingons were blocking the Enterprise's sensors.

[Iroscato]

What amuses me is that you can completely ignore Generations and not miss a single beat for it. Just start off with First Contact in a new ship, a couple of years after All Good Things. Considering it killed the E-D AND James Kirk within an hour of each other, it's an amazingly forgettable film.

[Patroklos]

Why would you use a Mk1 eyeball? We already use computers to scan and notice visual occulting of stars to find things in our sky. No, put the ships computer on it. examining the surface of the planet down to the square centimeter in seconds would be child's play compared to what we see it do with sensor data in the series. Of course maybe this completely obvious and basic method of examining your surroundings is absent from their capabilities. Its not like visually examining their surroundings to find the supposedly hard to find has ever been useful in ST before...

All that assumes that the Enterprise computer is able to search the entire surface of a planet fast enough to pick up a vaguely defined target object. Unless Worf reacted to the request to scan the planet by immediately just saying "Nope. Can't be done." and then playing Tribble Hunter 2371 on his console, it seems likely that he was trying to scan the planet visually, but just not getting anywhere.

We could assume that, but that would be ridiculous to assume given what we have seen the ship's computer and its sensors do. We routinely see Picard call up visuals of objects up to light years away and enhance those pictures to perfect resolution, so the idea that the ENT-Ds sensor suite is not up to visually scanning a planet to the most minute detail from mere orbit is not plausible.

As to whether it can then process that visual data, again the ENT-D sensors routinely scans huge areas, 245 cubic light years in real time with detailed results in one example (TOS "The Enterprise Incident). Other, sometimes more impressive instances are catalogued in this link:

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Long_range_sensor_scan

Does any of that prove it can be done? No. Does it suggest that doing so would be a trivial matter to the sensor suite and computer we see in the series? Yes.

[Borgholio]

The accuracy of the sensors can be demonstrated in First Contact. While that was the E-E instead of the E-D, same idea applies. Data can scan the entire planet and determine that each and every single one of the 9-billion lifesigns on the planet is Borg. That implies great accuracy. Another example was in the Unification plot arc where a long range sensor scan into Romulan space is able to pinpoint Spock with enough detail and accuracy to see his facial features.

[DaveJB]

Their sensors are certainly accurate enough... when they know what they're looking for and when the sensors (which use various other detection methods, they aren't just giant cameras) aren't crippled by interference. To use another E-D example, they were never able to detect the thousands of drones aboard the Borg cube in "Q Who?" even when they were sitting right next to it, and after it was reduced to a state of minimal power after the Enterprise blasted chunks out of it.

In Generations they were likely limited to optical scans only. Resolution wouldn't be an issue at that distance, it'd be how fast the computer could optically scan the entire surface of the planet, compare it to known orbital scans of the type of weapons platforms that Soran could feasibly use to launch his missile, discard all the false positives, and find the most likely site. Now, I'll admit that the Enterprise computer probably could do that eventually, given that we've seen it do such things as extrapolate a person's entire face from only their right eye and cheek. The question is, would it be able to do it on a fast enough timescale to stop Soran? Honestly, I don't recall any occasions where they did anything like that; usually when the sensors went down the crew usually either gave up immediately or tried to technobabble their way around the problem.

[Borgholio]

To use another E-D example, they were never able to detect the thousands of drones aboard the Borg cube in "Q Who?" even when they were sitting right next to it, and after it was reduced to a state of minimal power after the Enterprise blasted chunks out of it.

That was when the Borg were first introduced, and they were seen as being part of the machine. So they detected a ship, not the individual components of the ship. Later on they learned to scan for the organic beings linked to the collective.