Star Trek and the misuse of the word "Territory"

Stofsk · Post by **Stofsk** » 2004-12-06 07:10am

I wasn't sure if you were referring to me though. But thanks.

Petrosjko · Post by **Petrosjko** » 2004-12-06 07:18am

Stofsk wrote:I wasn't sure if you were referring to me though. But thanks.

For future reference, whenever I'm disagreeing with you I'll refer to you as a 'dirty little semantics whore'.

Winston Blake · Post by **Winston Blake** » 2004-12-06 07:29am

Stofsk wrote:
Winston Blake wrote:Well, i suppose you should have each system, with a sphere of protected territorial space around them, and a web of routes connecting every system with every other system.
Why the sphere pushing out from the system though? Again, how do you claim all that space? There is VAST mineral wealth in the Sol system. I don't think there would even be a need to push out and claim 8000 LY across territory. Because, you can't use all of it. And you can't really patroll all of it too.

I don't quite get you. I meant a small sphere around each individual star system, maybe just 10 million kilometers. Against the vastness of space, effectively i'm just talking about practically point-like systems connected by practically line-like routes.

However, as the number of systems grows, the number of routes grows explosively, and the surface area you have to patrol/scan (to make sure an enemy fleet isn't massing just outside one of your systems) grows explosively too. Every system is equally vulnerable to attack, since only the buffer zone of territorial space is protected.
And yet, if the defences were pulled in to the planets they are supposed to protect, defence doesn't become as big a problem as you suggest. Afterall, if you were the Admiral of the Fleet and CinC of SFC, what would you prefer to protect: 150 earth-sized planets or 8000 LY of empty space? This isn't a difficult decision.

If you only protect each individual planet what stops an enemy from blockading you or concentrating a fleet just outside sensor range? You need to be able to get between planets/asteroid belts/stations/etc. If you want ships to get to another system safely you also need to protect the straight-line route between.

Declaring the entire volume that your systems occupy to be 'super-territorial' space makes it far easier (in terms of surface area) to detect/inspect/engage ships before they can approach any of your systems.

You either have a choice of putting a ten thousand ships in orbit of 150 worlds, or telling the ten thousand to patrol 8000 LY of space. Which is EASIER from a defence perspective? Those 150 worlds have all your people on them, so defending them is a moral obligation, yet if you patrolled the 8000 LY across territory you get stretched thin.

So you're effectively saying that every planet is isolated from every other planet, and if cargo/civilian ships want to get from one place to another, intrasystem or intersystem, they risk being destroyed by enemy ships lurking between (even military ships could get ambushed). If you want to protect routes between systems it will require a large number of escorts or patrolling 'highway police'.

Denying any enemy military ships access to this volume is functionally identical to drawing a border and saying "This is mine. Stay out." So an imaginary star empire could conceivably 'own' vast tracts of empty, deep space.
As long as you concede that such territory is ultimately arbitrary and doesn't make sense from a resource-access viewpoint. Again, this is in Insurrection: the Federation 'owns' the planet with those country folksy morons living on it, yet those country folksy morons didn't apply for membership and AREN'T members either. How can such an action be justifed?

I wasn't talking about the Federation in particular, hence the general phrase "an imaginary star empire". In Insurrection, the Federation actually did own the planet, simply because it was in their territory, which is NOT what i'm suggesting. Not letting enemy ships into a certain volume is basically the same as declaring that volume to be yours.

EDIT: Also, transgressions by enemy ships trying to sneak into your volume by entering far away from any systems, if detected, could be engaged and a pivotal battle fought in barren space.
The problem is, detection at such ranges becomes hideously unworkable and expensive. Consider the problems in border security the US and even our own country has. ESPECIALLY our own country. So much coastline to patrol, too few resources to do so. Even radar barely helps. Its too large a stretch of land. Expand this to the size of 8000 LY across. Do you REALLY think it's at all workable?

If you consider the fact you have to defend the access routes between points of interest and not just the points themselves, then it's better to patrol/sensor scan the surface of a rough spheroid than the surface of hundreds of thousands of intricate web strands.

Stofsk · Post by **Stofsk** » 2004-12-06 07:45am

Winston Blake wrote:I don't quite get you. I meant a small sphere around each individual star system, maybe just 10 million kilometers. Against the vastness of space, effectively i'm just talking about practically point-like systems connected by practically line-like routes.

Why not establish the radius from the settled planet though, as that makes more sense?

If you only protect each individual planet what stops an enemy from blockading you or concentrating a fleet just outside sensor range?

Blockading? Blockading a solar system? Good luck.

What's to stop the Romulans from sneaking in a Fleet? The Tachyon detection thing. So what's stopping them from going through 'klingon space' and then going into the UFP from that angle? Once inside, they can hide in the vast stretches of UFP space. They're already here...

You need to be able to get between planets/asteroid belts/stations/etc. If you want ships to get to another system safely you also need to protect the straight-line route between.

How? Try protecting the SE Asia pacific region. Try protecting our coastline. You can't. All you can really do is protect the angles of approach to population centers.

Command of the sea was determined to be infeasible and inflexible. Denial of the sea and temporary control of the sea was what evolved to replace this idea.

So you're effectively saying that every planet is isolated from every other planet, and if cargo/civilian ships want to get from one place to another, intrasystem or intersystem, they risk being destroyed by enemy ships lurking between (even military ships could get ambushed). If you want to protect routes between systems it will require a large number of escorts or patrolling 'highway police'.

No need. There's a lot of mineral wealth in the solar system, right. So I dont need Dytallix B mining camp, because that's in an uninhabited system. But if I can maneuver an asteroid in orbit of one of my 150 member worlds, I can have all the resources I want without having to set up these web like networks. Furthermore, in WW1 and 2 it was shown that merchant ships are vulnerable even if the enemy doesn't have a 'command of the sea' fleet: Germany sunk thousands of tonnes of Allied shipping, with uboats, not battle fleets. Convoys put a stop to this.

I don't need fleets to patrol vast stretches of territory, i can just use convoy escorts.

I wasn't talking about the Federation in particular, hence the general phrase "an imaginary star empire". In Insurrection, the Federation actually did own the planet, simply because it was in their territory, which is NOT what i'm suggesting. Not letting enemy ships into a certain volume is basically the same as declaring that volume to be yours.

But you can't stop them. Again, try blockading the Romulan fleet from sneaking in three warbirds into Klingon space. You can't do it. With 20 ships? No way.

BUT, try and prevent those three warbirds from approaching the rendevous planet. That's a lot easier to manage.

If you consider the fact you have to defend the access routes between points of interest and not just the points themselves, then it's better to patrol/sensor scan the surface of a rough spheroid than the surface of hundreds of thousands of intricate web strands.

No it wouldn't. How would patrolling the volume encompassing two solar systems work when compared to patrolling the narrow route between them? How is patrolling a territory 8000 LY across more plausible than patrolling the orbital space of 150 planets?

Bellator · Post by **Bellator** » 2004-12-06 07:49am

Guarding and patrolling borders in Star Trek is unworkable, and we've seen plenty of canon evidence supporting this. Phrases like "we're the only ship in the sector" and "the closest starship is X lightyears away". We've seen plenty of evidence of smugglers and spies like flying in and out of Federation space. And when an enemy invades, such as the Borg or the Breen, they can fly virtually unopposed through Federation space to Earth. All this makes it seem that "territory" when referring to empty space is little more than a diplomatic agreement between various empires to preserve the status quo.

Petrosjko · Post by **Petrosjko** » 2004-12-06 07:57am

Furthermore, defending commercial lines on a straight-line basis between worlds is pretty much an unworkable concept... I'm not sure of how many member worlds there are in the Federation, but considering that every world would potentially have a straight-line connection with every other world would mean thousands upon thousands of lines to protect.

The only way a defense could be done is via a convoy system, because any potential enemy would likely have the advantage of local concentration of force against whatever forces could be put into patrol duties.

Stofsk · Post by **Stofsk** » 2004-12-06 08:10am

Petrosjko wrote:The only way a defense could be done is via a convoy system, because any potential enemy would likely have the advantage of local concentration of force against whatever forces could be put into patrol duties.

Yes. In war time, all merchant shipping will be brought under protection of convoys ANYWAY. In peacetime, the only problem comes from piracy. And as Larry Niven said, any shmuck who can make money from piracy in space would make more being legitimate.

RedImperator · Post by **RedImperator** » 2004-12-06 02:21pm

The Federation can claim 8000 light years as its territory because nobody can contest it. It's as simple as that. Most of that territory is out in the ass end of the Alpha Quadrant, while all its major rivals are clustered in the Beta Quadrant, where there are relatively short borders to defend. The plane of the galaxy is not very deep compared to its size, so it's possible to have a border as a meaningful concept. Instead of a line, it's a two dimensional plane surrounding your territory and stretching up and down deep into the halo. Warp drive is slow enough that it wouldn't be practical to go around that wall. At the same time, it's fast enough to respond to incursions across the border. You COULD claim the entire ocean as your territory if your ships were fast enough and your sensor net good enough that you could sink anyone trying to enter it, and that seems to be largely the case along the Federation border with the other major powers.

The Federation DOES effectively control its territory, at least that territory near the borders of the other major powers, as evidenced by the fact that the Klingons and Romulans can't fly around it with impunity (and likewise, can't enter Romulan or Klingon territory unless they're invited or they sneak in). Out in the boonies is another matter, but there were wide swaths of western North America which were considered American or British territory in the mid-1800s which were completely out of their control, too.

Now, if you want to get into the ethics of claiming inhabited planets as territory without consulting the locals, that's another matter. But it doesn't relate to the claim that territory doesn't, or shouldn't, exist in the Star Trek universe.

Typhonis 1 · Post by **Typhonis 1** » 2004-12-06 02:29pm

I think like others have said its metrley a holdover from our own perceptions of "Territory " here on the Earth. It merley is a simple way to show Who controls What to a bunch of short attention span people wtching your show And it helps RPers know where they are ...for example in Traveller there are also territories held by the Alsn,Vagr an Third Imperium.

Winston Blake · Post by **Winston Blake** » 2004-12-06 07:27pm

Stofsk wrote:
Winston Blake wrote:I don't quite get you. I meant a small sphere around each individual star system, maybe just 10 million kilometers. Against the vastness of space, effectively i'm just talking about practically point-like systems connected by practically line-like routes.
Why not establish the radius from the settled planet though, as that makes more sense?

Because there might be more than one point of interest in a system, the vast mineral wealth of the solar system you mentioned is bound up in asteroids and gas giants. There might be more than one settled planet per system, and orbital colonies (e.g. mining Jupiter) also need to be protected.

If you only protect each individual planet what stops an enemy from blockading you or concentrating a fleet just outside sensor range?
Blockading? Blockading a solar system? Good luck.

Hence "each individual planet". If you admit that protecting an entire system makes it impossible to blockade, why are you so against the idea?

What's to stop the Romulans from sneaking in a Fleet? The Tachyon detection thing. So what's stopping them from going through 'klingon space' and then going into the UFP from that angle? Once inside, they can hide in the vast stretches of UFP space. They're already here...

I'm not talking about the Federation, but the idea that a country-like territory is a completely moronic brainbug for space operas in general.

You need to be able to get between planets/asteroid belts/stations/etc. If you want ships to get to another system safely you also need to protect the straight-line route between.
How? [snip]

The same way you would protect a sphere around a planet. Patrolling ships, long range sensors, early warning systems, armed stations, etc.

So you're effectively saying that every planet is isolated from every other planet, and if cargo/civilian ships want to get from one place to another, intrasystem or intersystem, they risk being destroyed by enemy ships lurking between (even military ships could get ambushed). If you want to protect routes between systems it will require a large number of escorts or patrolling 'highway police'.
No need. There's a lot of mineral wealth in the solar system, right. So I dont need Dytallix B mining camp, because that's in an uninhabited system. But if I can maneuver an asteroid in orbit of one of my 150 member worlds, I can have all the resources I want without having to set up these web like networks. Furthermore, in WW1 and 2 it was shown that merchant ships are vulnerable even if the enemy doesn't have a 'command of the sea' fleet: Germany sunk thousands of tonnes of Allied shipping, with uboats, not battle fleets. Convoys put a stop to this.

I don't need fleets to patrol vast stretches of territory, i can just use convoy escorts.

There aren't any submarines in space. I did mention the idea of escorts above. If we take this idea of an empire that has no intersystem travel, with each system a self-contained autonomous unit, then yes, it would probably be better to defend each system with an individual defense fleet.

I wasn't talking about the Federation in particular, hence the general phrase "an imaginary star empire". In Insurrection, the Federation actually did own the planet, simply because it was in their territory, which is NOT what i'm suggesting. Not letting enemy ships into a certain volume is basically the same as declaring that volume to be yours.
But you can't stop them. Again, try blockading the Romulan fleet from sneaking in three warbirds into Klingon space. You can't do it. With 20 ships? No way.

BUT, try and prevent those three warbirds from approaching the rendevous planet. That's a lot easier to manage.

I'm not talking about Star Trek. If they can detect ships crossing into their super-territorial volume, then they don't have to wait until they strike up close and personal.

If we take your example of 10 000 ships and 150 worlds, each world gets 67 ships. If an equivalent rival empire takes just 2 ships from each planet, they can infiltrate it's space anywhere, at any time, sneak up close to any planet and overwhelmingly outnumber the defense fleet. The enemy could jump from one planet to another, eventually destroying the entire fleet, and they have no idea where they are or when and where they'll attack next (until it's too late) because all their ships are confined to within a few thousand kilometers of each planet. If you set up a detection grid on the surface of a spheroid containing all your systems, you can at least scramble a task force to intercept them en route or alert and reinforce the defenses around the closest systems.

If you consider the fact you have to defend the access routes between points of interest and not just the points themselves, then it's better to patrol/sensor scan the surface of a rough spheroid than the surface of hundreds of thousands of intricate web strands.
No it wouldn't. How would patrolling the volume encompassing two solar systems work when compared to patrolling the narrow route between them? How is patrolling a territory 8000 LY across more plausible than patrolling the orbital space of 150 planets?

That's with 2 systems, giving 1 route. I said that as the number of systems grows, the number of routes grows explosively. Imagine all possible lines between two points. Try three. Four. Five. Try 10 000. The empire ends up looking like a sponge. Two way travel between all systems on a regular basis will need a lot of escorts, and the convoys can still be ambushed. The enemy ships can weave their way through and attack anything they want, undetected.

Stofsk · Post by **Stofsk** » 2004-12-06 10:45pm

RedImperator wrote:The Federation can claim 8000 light years as its territory because nobody can contest it. It's as simple as that.

*snip*

But it doesn't relate to the claim that territory doesn't, or shouldn't, exist in the Star Trek universe.

Just to update my position: I don't think territory as a concept shouldn't exist in Star Trek, it's just the way they do it which strikes me as absurd. At the very least, arbitrary. As you say, they can claim that much space because no one can really challenge them to do otherwise.

To my mind it would have made more sense to have a system where territory is determined by how many settled planets you have. It just seems less arbitrary.

Now, if you want to get into the ethics of claiming inhabited planets as territory without consulting the locals, that's another matter.

Why not discuss it now, anyway? Is there any reason why the Federation decided to claim vast amounts of space, including inhabited, non-aligned planets, as existing within their territory?

frigidmagi · Post by **frigidmagi** » 2004-12-06 10:56pm

Is there any reason why the Federation decided to claim vast amounts of space, including inhabited, non-aligned planets, as existing within their territory?

To keep someone else from getting them first? Or just because they can and no one can stop them?

Petrosjko · Post by **Petrosjko** » 2004-12-06 11:16pm

Because the dialectic dictates that all systems will eventually throw off their running dog oppressors and join the benevolent Federation, y'see.

RedImperator · Post by **RedImperator** » 2004-12-07 12:06am

Stofsk wrote:
RedImperator wrote:The Federation can claim 8000 light years as its territory because nobody can contest it. It's as simple as that.

*snip*

But it doesn't relate to the claim that territory doesn't, or shouldn't, exist in the Star Trek universe.
Just to update my position: I don't think territory as a concept shouldn't exist in Star Trek, it's just the way they do it which strikes me as absurd. At the very least, arbitrary. As you say, they can claim that much space because no one can really challenge them to do otherwise.

To my mind it would have made more sense to have a system where territory is determined by how many settled planets you have. It just seems less arbitrary.

When you're dealing with nation states, arbitrary is how the game works. The Federation is 8000 light years across because it says so and nobody can tell it different. The Romulan and Klingon empires are apparently much smaller, but they can probably defend all of it (the fact that the two states are probably capable of contesting each others' claims in the Beta Quadrant probably has something to do with that).

The Feds probably plan to settle all that empty space eventually. That might be the rationale for all those tiny 5000 and 10000 person colonies out in the ass end of nowhere--they're solidifying territorial claims, and possibly trying to seed future member planets.

Now, if you want to get into the ethics of claiming inhabited planets as territory without consulting the locals, that's another matter.
Why not discuss it now, anyway? Is there any reason why the Federation decided to claim vast amounts of space, including inhabited, non-aligned planets, as existing within their territory?

There's historical precedent for this. The policy of the Spanish Empire was, basically, if we explored it, it's ours. At one point, Spain claimed all of the Americas PLUS the Pacific Ocean (the whole thing) as theirs, and would attack any other Europeans they found there, because they found them first. My guess is that the Federation sent long range explorers like the Constitution, Excelsior, and Galaxy out into the void, and anywhere they went where they didn't find a warp-capable civilization, they claimed it as Federation space. They probably have scattered settlements deep in their territory which basically exist so that they'll have a causus belli if another warp capable state fools around nearby.

They don't even have to explore the interior of that space. Just push out the boundaries of the bubble and claim the entire interior volume for yourself. You can worry about what's inside later.

Post by **Steve** » 2004-12-12 01:58am

Given the particular fluid nature of warp travel (on-the-spot course changes) and the fact that ships can be intercepted at warp, the need to control empty interstellar space becomes obvious.

Battles will still mostly happen near star systems, but claiming the space between systems is probably seen as a legal necessity to ensure territorial continuity. Otherwise, given the nature of Trek FTL and sensors, a potential enemy could set up a deep space facility in an area surrounded by your systems and use that facility, in time of war, to severely disrupt yor lines of communication, thus forcing you to invest time and manpower into reducing and destroying these facilities. After all, if only systems and "territorial space" around them is claimed, then there's a whole bunch of little areas where hostile powers can send ships through, legally, that could maintain powerful naval stations that threaten colonies, military facilities, trade routes, etc.

Trek civs don't actually need billions of ships to control their space; FTL and sophisticated FTL sensor nets mean that you could effectively "patrol" vast areas of interstellar space with only a relative handful of starships. Instead of having tons of ships per cubic light year just to patrol, one could use electronics to take up the burden. Though that has it's own drawbacks.

But yes, we generally get back to the point that the method of FTL in the Trek universe is such that it requires a concept of empty space between claimed systems being the sovereign "territory" of the nation in question, no matter how useless it is.