Name: Dreadnought!
Author: Diane Carey
Publication Date: 5/1986
Publisher: Pocket Books (Star Trek #29)
Page Number: 252
Historian’s Note: Sometime between The Counter-clock Incident and The Motion Picture
Cast of Characters: Captain James T. Kirk Commander Spock Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA
“Bones” Lieutenant Commander
Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”
Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu
Lieutenant Nyota Uhura Dr.
Joseph M'Benga Dr. Merete
AndrusTaurus Lieutenant Piper Lieutenant Sarda Lieutenant (junior grade) Judd
"Scanner" Sandage Nurse
Christine Chapel Ensign Pavel
Chekov Ensign Diana Flores Ensign Rachel Lanz Crewman
Baldridge Crewman Broxon Crewman Carr Crewman Hopton Crewman Meyers Crewman Novelwry Cadet Telosirizharcrede Dr. Samuel Boma Vice Admiral Vaughan Rittenhouse Commodore Roy Nash Captain Stephen Leedson Captain Sukaru Tutakai Captain Niditoricumtu Ro Commander Josephson Commander
Paul Burch Commander Lu Sing Quaid Commander Susan Yin Lieutenant Illya Galina Lieutenant Page Lieutenant Brian Silayna Lieutenant Li Wang Ensign
Booth
Starships and/or Starbases: USS Enterprise NCC-1701, USS
Hornet NCC-1714, USS Pompeii NCC-424, USS Potemkin, USS Star Empire MKC-2331, USS
Lincoln (unknown registration), Gray Matter, Stocking Cap, Wooden Shoe, Zipper
Fly, and several unknown Klingon battle cruisers
Planets: Earth
My Spoiler filled summary and review: The story
begins the same way The Wrath of Khan does with the Kobayashi Maru. Lt. Piper, (who has no other name like
Madonna) a graduate student at Starfleet Academy’s command program is taking
the test. Her performance ends like they all do, her ship is destroyed. She set the second longest run-time in
Academy history. This performance gets
her a placement on the USS Enterprise. 
Like Saavik years later, Piper takes the Kobayashi Maru test
Piper arrives on the Enterprise
and upon her arrival she meets a few roommates that she will be having. The rooms are co-ed and co-multiple
species. Among her new roommates is a
Gorn who is first ever Starfleet cadet.
She also discovers her former love interest, a Vulcan named Lt. Sarda,
whom she often teases, exposing her ignorance of Vulcan culture, to his clear
annoyance. 
Gorn in the Academy
Before she can even get changed Lt.
Piper is summoned to the bridge. When
she gets to the bridge, she is debriefed by Kirk and Spock about their
mission. A Starfleet prototype starship
called the USS Star Empire of new class of starship called the
Dreadnoughts, has been stolen by rouge Starfleet officers. The rebels have sent a message, but it can
only be accessed using Lt. Piper’s bio code.
Piper has no idea why this is.
The Enterprise warps out to meet Star Empire and a rendezvous point. When they get there, they find the Dreadnought being attacked by four Klingon Birds of Prey. The Enterprise intervenes by destroying one Klingon ship and crippling another. However, two remaining still outnumber the Constitution-class starship. Then the damaged ship the Klingons thought they were fighting turns out to be a sensor projection and that the real Star Empire is hiding. It enters the battle and dispatches the two Klingon ships.
 |
| Dreadnought class |
When it comes time to talk the
Piper bio-code is given so communications are open. Piper recognizes the man on the other end as
Lt. Brian Silayna. Lt. Silayna reads a message from Commander
Paul Burch stating that they have seized the dreadnaught in the name of
galactic civility and request an ambassadorial party of Kirk, Piper, and a
Vulcan (it apparently doesn’t much which one). As not one to negotiate with
terrorists Kirk cuts the transmission and orders Piper arrested for conspiracy.
Piper doesn’t stay locked up for
long, using an old engineering trick she breaks out of confinement and walks
into her Vulcan ex-boyfriend. Sarda is upset that by the way Starfleet is using
his weapons designs, so he joins her. He
also informs her that the dreadnought is now out of range so they can’t just
transport over. Instead of a
shuttlecraft they steal a 2-seat Arco-class light attack "sled" that
Starfleet must have invented yesterday because I have never heard of it
before. They manage to take off before
anyone realizes that they are gone.
They don’t get to the Star Empire, however because the destroyer Pompeii drops out of warp, uses a tractor beam to haul their sled inside its hangar bay. The two runaways meet Vice-Admiral Rittenhouse, who informs them that Commander Burch was his personal aide until he betrayed him. The Admiral is convinced that the Commander is insane. The Enterprise arrives and interestingly Kirk doesn’t tell the Admiral that the two officers he has are there via an escape. After the conversation with Kirk ends, Rittenhouse discusses the recent galactic political situation and hints at his desire to unite the various galactic governments under a common flag of peace.
 |
| Pompeii |
Piper, becoming suspicious of
Rittenhouse, uses the destroyer's computer to access Starfleet and Federation
organizational charts. She and Sarda find a disturbing pattern: men that had
served with Rittenhouse over the years had been placed in high levels of the
civilian and military leadership, including the captains of the three other
starships that are on their way. Believing Rittenhouse may be planning a
military coup, Piper tries to contact the Enterprise, only to be caught
and thrown in the brig, again.
Piper explains to Sandra that
Rittenhouse has dreams of galactic conquest that would never work not because
it’s physically impossible but because it would violate her libertarian world
view. She knows this is true because she wrote a paper on it back in college.
Piper and Sandra escape again,
showing us, the brigs are kind of useless.
While escaping they recruit some help from friends they have on board, Lt.
Sandage and Dr. AndrusTaurus. Together
they come across a meeting between Rittenhouse and his various captains and spy
on it. It turns out all the Enterprise
officers despise one of the Admiral’s top assistants, a civilian scientist
named Dr. Boma. Kirk, refusing to go
along with the Admiral’s plan to kill everyone on the Star Empire finds
himself, Spock, McCoy, and Scotty all arrested.
Piper and her companions decide to
rescue the senior Enterprise officers only to find that the four had
already escaped themselves. It turns out
Kirk and the rest were moving to try to save Piper and her friends. They all work to sabotage the destroyer. Kirk’s group escapes to the Enterprise
while Piper and her team continue their sabotage.
Piper threatens to self-destruct
the Arco attack sled they arrived on and take out the destroyer with it.
Rittenhouse, to save himself, allows them to escape. The four of them escape in
two attack sleds, skimming along the destroyer's hull to avoid being shot by
the Pompeii's phaser batteries. Piper destroys one phaser bank, then the
two sleds fly away from the destroyer and towards the Star Empire.
Turns out that the Star Empire
has only a skeleton crew of bureaucrats who have no idea how to run a
starship. So, despite the fact that they
are on a starship that should easily destroy their opponents, they really are
sitting ducks. It is Piper who is the
one who gets them to stop using the computer incorrectly so they can survive.
Enterprise enters the battle, but it
does not go well and must surrender.
However, it turns out that surrender is just a ruse to allow the enemy
to lower their shields and the Enterprise can then cause heavy damage to
two enemy ships with a surprise phaser attack.
Due to injuries aboard Star Empire, Piper is forced to take
command as the only officer with any tactical experience. She puts her ship in
between their opponents and the Enterprise and threatens to destroy
their four adversaries with the dreadnought’s superior fire power. Three ships
retreat but the Pompeii calls her bluff and flies straight at the Star
Empire. Rittenhouse is right and Piper can’t bring herself to fire upon
them. Kirk can, however, and the Enterprise
destroys the Pompeii.
With the Rittenhouse conspiracy
exposed the Federation is saved from a mad military coup. Piper is given the Medal of Valor and a
promotion to the rank of Lieutenant Commander.
She closes with joke shared with Captain Kirk.
Additional thoughts: This was a fun action-packed
adventure. An interesting plot with a good epic space naval battle. I thought it was interesting that they
started this adventure with a Kobayashi Maru test it was a good connection to
what was established in The Wrath of Khan. It
appears that this test is set up for graduate students in Command school. Piper like Saavik before her is already a
commissioned officer in Starfleet. In fact,
Piper is already a full lieutenant where Saavik will be a lieutenant (junior
grade) when her time comes.
So, the Gorn are in Starfleet
now. One day a Gorn Captain is engaged in fisticuffs with Captain Kirk and now we are welcoming them into
Starfleet. Won’t the Metrons be so
impressed with us? They might want to
get to know us better in a few centuries and not a few millennia.
I thought it was interesting that
this story centered on Starfleet officers stealing a starship when the last
time the audience saw are heroes, they themselves did exactly that. You have to wonder if Kirk and Scotty picked
up any ideas on how to steal the Enterprise in The Search for Spock
from the theft of the Star Empire.
So apparently Serek isn’t the only Vulcan with an eye for human ladies. Piper’s ex-boyfriend is the Vulcan Lt. Sarda. It’s clear why their relationship never worked. The way Piper misunderstands and tries to tease him about his culture it’s a surprise that Sarda even puts up with Piper.
 |
| Bird of Prey |
It was nice to see Klingon Birds of
Prey in action. Considering the only time,
we saw the Enterprise face off against one she was severely damaged and
had a crew of five. Although Commander
Kruge said that the Enterprise outguns his ship ten to one, and that
under normal circumstances his little ship would be crushed, it was hard to see
the Enterprise’s last battle be against something it should overwhelm
but never got the opportunity to. This
time we got to see the Enterprise handle multiple Birds of Prey and
destroying/damaging some. Bird of Prey
The Star Empire’s
capabilities raise the question why starships aren’t built like this all the
time anyway. To be fair it is not made
for exploration it was made for conquest.
It clearly wasn’t unbeatable as Rittenhouse had a plan to take it down
with a fleet of starships. However, it
is to be noted that he would need a fleet to do that with.
I think my favorite part of this
book is the return of Boma. In my review
of the episode “The Galileo Seven” I could not stand the three Starfleet
lieutenants who harassed Spock. Boma
wasn’t alone in his insubordination, but he gave a lot. Not only that but he had questionable ethics:
how many lives do you risk recovering a dead body. I am glad Mr. Scott reported him to the
Captain, and he deserved to be drummed out of the service. 
bad officers
I wasn’t particularly keen on the
author’s clear libertarian views, which she presents as clear historical facts,
and Sarda backs up a lot of her statements.
Even agreeing that there is no real thing such as “the public good.” It
was also weird when Piper argued with a crewmate who happened to victim or
Orion pirates, and as such was supporting Admiral Rittenhouse. Piper tries to argue that Rittenhouse’s
method won’t work and “Klingons and Orions have a right to be what they are.” Really, Piper.
One would think their rights to be “as they are” would end where someone
else’s rights began. If Klingons like to
kill and conquer and Orions like to kill and lout, wouldn’t the right of other
intelligent beings to not be the victims of such behavior be more important and
worth defending. There are other reasons
to be against Rittenhouse’s plan, attacking every other galactic power all at
once with the aim of total conquest seems rather suicidal no matter how many
dreadnoughts you may have.
During the battle the Enterprise
pretends to surrender and then attacks.
The problem is that is a war crime.
It’s called perfidy. Is a deceptive tactic where one side
pretends to act in good faith in laying down of arms and singling surrender, but
does so with the deliberate intention of attacking when the other side is prepared to receive said surrender. Now I understand the laws are different in 23rd
century but I don’t think that would have changed.
This story often gets accused of
the “Mary Sue” stereotype. With Piper being the “Mary Sue.” I don’t feel that’s
the case. Piper isn’t uniquely talented
or the best at anything. She often
screws up. At times she is a real jerk,
especially to her ex-boyfriend. Although
her jerkiness seems to come from more ignorance than malice. These are traits Sues typically don’t have.
Although the book does commit the sin of having the traditional Star Trek
characters being reduced to guest stars in a story in their series.
Another little thing I noticed is
everyone calls Vice Admiral Rittenhouse “Vice Admiral.” This is weird because colloquially Vice Admirals
are just called, “Admiral.”
This also book also seems to be the
start of “Bad Admiral” or as it is known “Badmiral” troupe. This becomes a thing in Star Trek with these
Admirals who have become corrupt and are up to no good. In the classic series there were a lot of
incompetent Federation commissioners, but no admirals. You could point out Admiral Iota in “The Web of the Romulans” but he wasn’t bad or evil just a little misguided. Vice
Admiral Vaughan Rittenhouse is our Badmiral #1.
Should it be canon: I was originally going to say no,
due to the sheer power of the Star Empire. It doesn’t quite add up with the rest of
Starfleet ship building history.
However, with its dismantling and discontinuation I suppose this story
could fit.
Cover Art: The cover has Captain Kirk at the bottom
towards the viewer’s left. Next to him on the viewer’s right is Lieutenants
Piper and Sarda. Above the characters is
the Star Empire in all its glory.
Final Grade: Final Grade 4 of 5
