JAMES T. KIRK, A CAPTAIN WHO OBEYS THE PRIME DIRECTIVE

 

Introduction

There are many myths about Captain Kirk, which is an odd thing considering he is a fictional character.  Nevertheless, there are a number of common misconceptions with the character’s popular image that don’t exist as part of the source material.  One example is what is typically dubbed “Shatner speak.”  This is explained as the act of talking as if there is a period after the end of every word.  This is most famous satirized by Jim Carrey during his time with Saturday Night Live.  Another myth is that he is frequent rule breaker, who does whatever he feels is right regardless of orders.  This is even popularized by the show itself most recently in the series Lower Decks where frequent rule-breaker Beckett Mariner calls herself a “Kirk-type” to justify her actions.  Then there of course the classical claim that he is a crazy womanizer as popularized most recently by the pregnant “Kirk was here” cosplayers.

  One of interesting things about the Star Trek franchise is it is so large that many fans, if not most, come into it sideways.  They don’t start at the beginning they start at whatever series was on when they begin watching.  When they come across the original series it is basically history for them.  It is not at all unusual to see on Star Trek fan forums this question posted, “So I just started watching the original series, pretty good so far, when does the whole Shatner-speak start?  I am almost through the first season and I haven’t seen it yet.” There are a few scenes where Kirk does talk slowly however these are normally in situations where the Captain has to be careful with his words.  He is in diplomatic situation or something similar.  The best example I think of is Kirk’s first scene with Khan in “The Wrath of Khan.”  

Over the years there have been many articles debunking these many myths.  Larry Womack of the Huffington Post wrote a great article in 2013 titled, In Defense of (the Original) James T. Kirk, where he tackles Kirk’s reputation of being a rule breaker and womanizer in the aftermath of the Kelvin Universe Star Trek films’ version of Captain Kirk, and John E Price of Medium wrote a similar piece called You Either Believe in Yourself or You Don’t: Star Trek Discovery, James T. Kirk, and the Power of Traditional Memory. Internet essayist and Star Trek enthusiast Steve Shives created a great video in 2018 titled Is Captain Kirk Actually a Womanizer to which he takes down that myth flat.

The myth that I want to tackle is the one that states Captain Kirk is not only a rule breaker but that he repeatedly violates Starfleet’s General Order Number One: The Prime Directive.  (As if you couldn’t tell that by the title.) As all fans know, the Prime Directive states that Starfleet will not interfere in the internal development of a foreign society, and if said society has not yet developed warp drive Starfleet is not even allowed to let that society know that Starfleet and the Federation exist.  The reason the Prime Directive exists is the Federation does not want the exploration of the universe to have the same devastating effect on alien societies that European exploration and colonization did to the many aboriginal societies of Earth.  However, it has it has its drawbacks and some would argue that Prime Directive itself is immoral.  For if a Starfleet vessel were to discover a world that was like 1930s Earth where fascist regimes were engaged in genocide of persecuted peoples.  Then that vessel would not do a thing to stop it.

"No identification of self or mission. No interference with the social development of said planet. No references to space, or the fact that there are other worlds, or more advanced civilizations." Dr. McCoy in "Bread and Circuses"

Kirk’s reputation of ignoring the Prime Directive is a recognized trait of his character and is mentioned both within Star Trek (Remember Janeway’s quote about 23^rd century officers being quick to draw their phasers and slow to invoke the Prime Directive?) and without.  There was an episode of JAG where the character Bud Roberts was able to get information from a terrorist by going over Star Trek trivia.  The incident is initiated by an argument over Kirk’s violation of the Prime Directive to which Bud says Kirk did “all the time.”

This is a myth.  Kirk only violated the Prime Directive once.  Yes, that is right I said it.  He only did it once, and it was under an extreme situation.  Now I know what you are thinking: “I have seen Star Trek X-number of times and I saw him violate the Prime Directive X-number of times much higher than 1.”  I know but you’re wrong and with that let’s go over Kirk’s relationship with the Prime Directive.             

When the Captain is Clearly Obeying

People are so caught up calling out Kirk for allegedly violating the Prime Directive that they forget how much he is a defender of it.  A good example of Kirk obeying is the episode “Bread and Circuses.”  In this episode the Enterprise travels to one of the many fake Earths that they encounter during Star Trek’s classical run.  On this fake Earth they find that the Roman Empire has survived until the 20^th century and they now have their gladiator games on TV.  A Federation merchant ship was stranded on the planet and Kirk is looking to retrieve them.  While they are there, they find some underground rebels.  After hanging out with the rebels they are captured by Roman authorities and taken to the Proconsul.  It turns out the Merchant Captain told the Proconsul everything about Starfleet and the Federation, including the Prime Directive.  In this episode Kirk has the means and the motive to overwhelm the Romans of Fake Earth with fire power and take the Federation citizens there by force.  However, Captain Kirk is restrained the by the Prime Directive, understanding that he and his crew will have to come up with a less direct way of getting the actions that they desire accomplished.  Which they do, they manage to remove the Federation elements from the Fake Earth with no one from the general population being the wiser.

Kirk is trying to find a way out of this mess without violating the Prime Directive

Another example is the episode “The Paradise Syndrome.” In this episode Kirk loses his memory and for a while is living with a Native American tribe whose ancestors were placed on this planet by the ancient Preservers.  There Kirk falls in love with a local woman named Miramanee and marries her.  When Kirk fails the tribe in a major way, they turn on him and stone him as a fraud, Miramanee tries to save him and is killed as a result.  Once Kirk’s memory is restored, he does not go back to the tribe and explain to them why they were wrong and blame them for killing Miramanee.  He recognizes the Prime Directive and ceases all contact with those people. He doesn’t even bother to explain to them how to turn on the Preserver device.

He interferes here but stops when his memory returns

Someone Else Already Interfered

The first batch of Captain Kirk’s so-called “violations” are actually already covered in an established portion of Starfleet law.  That if interference on an alien culture has already happened then a Starfleet crew is allowed to correct the imbalance, try to expunge the interference, or cut the losses and make the best out of a bad situation. The first of these can be seen in the episode “A Private Little War” here Captain Kirk returns to a planet named Neural that he once visited as a young lieutenant, I am assuming before he ran into the vampire cloud, only to discover that the Klingons have shown up and armed the villagers with advanced weaponry and sent them to attack the hill people. Upon confirming the Klingons involvement Kirk arms and trains the hill people with the same weapons that Klingons provided the villagers.  Kirk isn’t breaking the Prime Directive here; he is giving the planet a course correction due to Klingon interference.

Looks like we already have interference

  The next example of this is “A Piece of the Action.”  In this episode the Enterprise travels to the planet Sigma Iotia II.  The planet was last visited by the Horizon over a century ago. At the time the Prime Directive had yet to be established and the crew thought nothing about leaving behind a book called The Chicago Mobs of the Twenties, along with some manuals about early twentieth century technology.  Now the entire population of the planet is living a world based of the gang culture of Prohibition-era Chicago.  Instead of leaving Kirk decides to undo some of the damage done by the accidental interference.  He gathers all the gangs, impresses them with his technology and fire power of his ship, and informs them that the Federation is “taking over” as “the prime operator.”  All the gangs will now have to get in line, Kirk then reorganizes their entire government for them.  

Not good!

The third case of this is one not caused by a slight error but one caused by extreme stupidity.  In the episode “Patterns of Force” a historian named John Gill travels the planet Ekos and finds it divided by war and chaos.  Amid this chaos the award-winning historian decided what this planet truly needs is some Nazism.  Nope, not kidding that is what he did.  Naturally, when the Enterprise arrives, they are shocked to say the least.  So, as such Captain Kirk and Spock go to the planet and after some great difficulty find Gill, who was no a prisoner and puppet figurehead by his deputy, they have him give a public confession and turn on his party.  The leave the planet in the hands of two allies they feel they can trust and leave.    

Exposing the Nazis

Finally, we have the episode “Omega Glory” where Captain Ronald Tracey of the Exter goes to Omega IV.  Omega IV is another one of those Fake Earth, this one where the Cold War got hot the world was destroyed and the survivors are still fighting each other even though they don’t remember why.  Tracey becomes convinced he can become immortal on this planet so he tried to aid one side by helping them fight their war by using phasers.  Kirk having discovered this moves to stop him and then helps the people of Omega IV correctly interpret their own “holy words.” With Tracey now their prisoner, Kirk and crew leave.

Its the captain with the phaser who is breaking the rules.

That Depends What Your Definition of “Developing” is

In other cases where Kirk appears to violate the Prime Directive, he doesn’t due to some creative reading of the text.  The Prime Directive states that they shall not interfere with the internal development of another culture.  Kirk reasons if the culture isn’t doing any developing then all bets are off.  I am also convinced that by the TNG era this interpretation has been eliminated via legislation.  Kind of like how Kirk led his own away missions but by the TNG era the regulations forbade a captain from doing that.

First example of this is in the episode “Miri.”  This episode is also famous for giving us our first-of-many Fake Earths.  The Enterprise arrives at this fake Earth only to discover that they took a dramatic turn from the real Earth in their version of the 1960s.  Trying to extend their natural lives into the centuries, they failed miserably and caused every adult on the planet to turn into a rabid monster that would tear things apart then quickly die.  The children did get the life extension but when they reached a point where their biological age leads them into puberty and they turn into monsters too.  Captain Kirk not only has McCoy discover away to save the landing party from the virus but he gives it to the kids and Starfleet sends teams to help the children rebuild their society.  Fake Earth culture was a frozen corpse so Kirk decided to interfere. 

This culture clearly stopped working

The second of example of this is the classic episode “The Return of the Archons.”  Here Captain Kirk and his crew travel to the planet Beta III and encounter a society that is ruled and managed by a computer.  Most people are kept in an altered mental state where they came to be part of “the body.” Those who are not are quickly made that way upon discovery.  There is evidence that this society was more advanced until a ruler named Landru created the “the body” to prevent war and bloodshed.  Kirk decides that this society is stagnant under the rule of a machine and decided to break the people free. He leaves behind some advisors to help that now free Betans to take control once again.

Weird state!

This is repeated in the second season episode “The Apple.” One on hand the episode is a clone of the pervious one discussed a society has come under the rule of computer who keeps the people in a primitive state.  There are some key differences however. Where Landru kept his people trapped in a 19^th century type society where Vaal keeps them in a Garden of Eden state.  Like before Kirk determines that this society is stagnant and not developing.  Kirk ends up destroying Vaal freeing the people to control their own destiny.

Explaining orders from Vaal!

When Starfleet Command Decides to Ignore the Prime Directive

Then there are times where Starfleet Command and the Federation decide to override the Prime Directive in certain situations.  The first example of this is the episode “Errand of Mercy.”  This is the episode that was the first appearance of the Klingons.  War has been declared between the two powers.  Starfleet recognizes the strategic location of Organian system.  As such we no longer care if they are a bunch of pre-warp primitives.  It’s not our fault the Klingons are coming anyway so Organians aren’t going to be allowed to develop naturally so this is a primitive planet is going to get a sudden upgrade.  Call it a preemptive.  It turns out the reverse happened far from the Federation and Klingon Empire dictating to the Organians, the Organians revel themselves to be gods and dictate to the two space powers.  Treaty is forced upon them and peace is saved.

When you realize they are the ones doing the telling!

The second time we see this is in the episode “Friday’s Child.”  In this case contact has been made with the natives of Capella IV in a mission that did not involve the Enterprise but one that Dr. McCoy participated in.  The reason Starfleet authorized such contact is the planet is bursting with dilithium crystals.  When the Federation sees a planet that produces dilithium crystals like this they get the same feeling that the United States does when they find an oil rich nation: that is a nation that can use some “freedom.”  Starfleet looks at Capella IV as one that can use some “advancement.” To be fair Starfleet wants this to be a voluntary transaction and they are not conquering them.  In the end with the new leader, Leonard James Akaar, enthroned Starfleet will probably have an easier time. 

Yes, we have your crystals

Speaking of involuntary we have the episode “Spretre of the Gun.”  Starfleet wants contact with the Melkotians so bad that they won’t let Kirk take “no” for an answer.  The Enterprise heads to Melkos and when the Melkotians demand they leave, Kirk’s orders tell him he must proceed anyway.  This ends up with the landing party stuck in a Western.  It’s a strange episode. 

Go Away!

The One Time Kirk Did Violate the Prime Directive

There was this one time that Captain Kirk did out right violate the Prime Directive.  That was in the episode “A Taste of Armageddon.” In this episode the Enterprise is on a diplomatic mission to the planets Eminiar VII and Vendikar.  The two worlds claim to have been at war over centuries although there is no evidence of any such thing on the surface.  It turns out they fight their war in a computer simulation.  This gives them all the casualties with none of the destruction of infrastructure.  This also means that the war where people die not only doesn’t stop it never slows down.  When the simulation is made all of those reported “killed” must report to disintegration chamber to have their vaporized and recorded as such.  They also tell the Captain that his ship was one of the casualties and therefore his entire crew must submit to be killed.  Now at this point Kirk could just escape, return to the Enterprise, and get the hell out of there.  However, he has another plan in mind.  He decides to destroy their machines and force them to fight their war for real.  Panicking at the thought of all the coming destruction the leaders of Eminiar VII agree to have Ambassador Fox agree to open negotiations with Vendikar. 

"I'm going to teach you to fight your war for real"

Now let’s be clear, there was no outside interference from either aliens, such as Klingons, or stupid humans who messed up something that Kirk had to correct.  The society was not failing to develop, in fact the whole purpose for this set-up was to allow for the society to continue to grow despite the war.  There was no command from Starfleet to ignore the Prime Directive.  Kirk just decided that he didn’t like what these people were doing so he was going to end it.  Why did Starfleet get away with it?  A novel I once read—that I can’t recall the name of—stated that the Federation was so horrified at what was being described that they chose to look the other way on the matter.

"Planning their break out!"

Conclusion

                In conclusion I hope I have convinced you that far from being a rebel, Captain Kirk was in fact a defender of Starfleet highest command. The exceptions are just that, exceptions, the reason there happens be so much is because writers need drama to have characters go through in order to give us a story.

 

THE KIRK DOCTRINE: SOME THINGS ARE SO BAD THAT THE PRIME DIRECTIVE CAN #*#* OFF

Episode Title:  A Taste of Armageddon

Air Date: 2/23/1967

Written by Robert Hamner and Gene L. Coon

Directed by Joseph Pevney

Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk    Leonard Nimoy as Lieutenant Commander Spock             DeForest Kelley as Dr. Leonard H. McCoy AKA “Bones”              James Doohan  as Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott AKA “Scotty”        David L. Ross as Lieutenant  Galloway            Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura          Sean Kenney as  Lieutenant DePaul            Eddie Paskey as Eminiar Guard                 Bill Blackburn as Lieutenant Haley and   Eminiar Technician             Miko Mayama  as Yeoman First Class Tamula   Jeannie Malone as unnamed Yeoman               Frank Da Vinci as Eminiar Guard                 Gene Lyons as Ambassador Robert Fox             Sean Morgan as Lieutenant O'Neil         Ron Veto as Eminiar Guard               David Opatoshu as Anan 7                 Barbara Babcock as  Mea 3            Robert Sampson as Sar 6            John Burnside as Eminiar Guard                 Dick Cherney as Council Member              Monty O'Grady as Council Member              Al Roberts as Council Member           Majel Barrett as Enterprise Computer            

                   

Ships: USS Enterprise NCC-1701

Planets:  Eminiar VII, Vendikar 

My Spoiler filled summary and review: The USS Enterprise is on a diplomatic mission to the planets of Eminiar VII and Vendikar.  These worlds have not been visited by Starfleet in over fifty years, at last report the two worlds were at war.  Lt. Uhura finally receives a signal from Eminiar, but unfortunately it is one telling their ship to go away.  Eminiar are using a code that they learned from the Valiant, the pervious Federation starship that arrived over a century ago.  The applied code #710 states: that under no circumstances are any Starfleet vessel to approach.   However, today on the Enterprise the crew is joined by Ambassador Robert Fox, who has the power to counterman Starfleet’s highest general orders whenever he thinks it’s necessary.    Fox, against objections from ship’s leadership, orders Captain Kirk to head to Eminiar anyway.  Apparently this planet exists on a vital location for the Federation.    

Captain Kirk with great reluctance obeys his orders, but since he is still in charge of the ship itself the Captain insists that he lead an away team down the planet to confirm that it is safe.  The away team of Kirk, Spock, a Yeoman, and two security officers transport down and they are met by a delegation led by a very attractive woman named Mea 3. I want to point out now that she doesn’t fall in love or make out with Captain Kirk.  There is a brief question to why the Enterprise ignored their request to be left alone but this quickly brushed aside and the Eminiar delegation is warm and welcoming.   Captain Kirk and his crew are even taken to meet the High Council of Eminiar.  Here Captain Kirk meets with the planet’s leader, Anan 7.

Anan 7 explains that he is disappointed the Enterprise has shown up because his planet is at war.  This statement takes Kirk and Spock by surprise as the planet from orbit shows absolutely no evidence of any sort of war.  They openly tell Anan this but he still insists they are.  An alarm goes off and their planet is now under attack.   Now the Enterprise away team gets really confused as Anan and the Council go over a map on their computer screen showing an attack.   The council members began moaning over the destruction and vowing to retaliate.  Despite the city they are in as one of the attacked places they can hear no explosions and tricorder readings show none on the entire planet.  The entire war is simply a simulation.

Planet's war leaves Away Team very confused!

We then get the explanation and it is a horrifying one.  Considering the horrors and destruction of traditional war the planets of Eminiar VII and Vendikar came up with  a deal during their conflict.  They would only fight simulated battles on a computer; therefore neither planet would lose and part of its vital infrastructure.  The catch was anyone who was reported as a casualty in the simulated battle must report to a disintegration chamber to be killed within twenty-four hours.  This is how they fight their war and the reported causalities are about seven million annually.  The war has now been fought like this for 500 years.  Their entire culture is now based around it. 

Spock points out to the Captain that there is certain logic to it. Anan is grateful for the approval to which Mr. Spock responds with one of Star Trek’s great lines pointing out that by saying he understood he is not giving approval. 

It is at this point that things go from bad to worse.  Anan explains that since the Enterprise was in orbit around Eminiar during the attack making it a legitimate target and Eminiar computers have recorded the starship as having been destroyed.  Although they are not required to destroy the ship as that is the point of the simulation, they required to have the crew come down so they can all be put to death.  The away team is not required to die as they aren’t part of the causalities but they are disarmed, detained, and communicators confiscated.  They need to be hostages to insure compliance.  

Anan and the Council try to trick the Enterprise crew by using a computer generated copy of the voice of Captain Kirk to lure the crew to their deaths.  Mr. Scott, who as second officer is in command of the Enterprise, isn’t fooled for a second and raises the ship’s shields.  Eminiar attacks but the Enterprise’s shields hold and the ship can keep its distance.  Ambassador Fox is infuriated he wanted to go the planet as soon as “Kirk” called up, but Scotty held firm.  Scotty vs. the Federation Ambassador continues as the small subplot to the episode. 

It had already been revealed that Vulcans have tactile telepathic capabilities, but Spock is now going to take it to another level.  He reaches out with his telepathy through a wall and pulls what seems like a Jedi mind trick twelve years before Obi-Wan Kenobi.   The away team escapes now free the have the unfortunate experience of seeing one of the disintegration chambers in action.  Mea, the woman who greeted them when they first arrived, is heading toward the disintegration chamber.  When the away team last saw her was right after they were imprisoned where she had also informed them that she was one of casualties.   In that conversation she told Kirk that her life was a dear to her as his was to him, but she had to do her duty or else disaster would befall her planet.  Now here she was to fulfill that duty.  The away team kidnaps her and they blow up the disintegration chamber with a disruptor they stole from the guards. 

Ambassador Fox secretly communicates with Anan who convinces him that firing upon the Enterprise was just a technical error and they didn’t mean anything by it and they just really wanted the crew to come down.  Fox, ever the optimist actually believes these packs of lies and as Eminiar powers down its weapons allowing the Enterprise to lower its shields, he transports down with his assistant to be promptly arrested and informed that he and his man are to be killed. 

Spock with some of the greatest red shirts of all time. Lose the shirts and dress in enemy uniform is a good way to stay alive.

 Kirk and his away team take the prisoner with them back to their cell because they think no one will bother to look for them there.  Kirk the has the Yeoman guard the Mea, and Spock will go with the two security officers now, dressed as Eminiar guards having stolen their uniforms, to attack more disintegration chambers.   While this is going on Kirk is going to go and get their communicators and phasers back.   

I really did want to see Mea test her luck with the Yeoman

Kirk confronts Anan to force him to give back the communicators and phasers.  Anan starts off remarkable cooperative but it turns out to be a ruse as Kirk is jumped by two Eminiar security officers.  Kirk using his skill at fighting, which is unparalleled throughout the galaxy, nearly holds them off but since they have a weapon he is effectively recaptured.

Matching wits with Anan 7

While Kirk was getting recaptured Spock and the two security officers destroy another disintegration chamber and free the Ambassador.  Fox agrees to follow Spock’s lead as they go off to find and rescue the Captain.

Anan tries one last time to get Kirk to order his own crew down to which Kirk does the opposite and instead shouts “General Order 24.”  Kirk then tells Anan that the order he just gave to Scotty means the engineer will now lead the Enterprise in attack on Eminiar destroying its weapons and leveling its cites.  Kirk boosts that when they do war they do the real thing.  This causes the panic among the Eminar and this allows Captain Kirk to drop all pretense of weakness and attacks the guards with his full fighting skill unrestrained.  Having never battled for real and only in simulation they were unprepared for the savagery of Kirk’s physical attack and were utterly defeated.  Spock arrives to see that all is well.

Mr. Spock rescues the Ambassador 

Kirk and Spock then destroy the battle simulators.  Anan then claims that he has condemned them to death.  Kirk declares that he has done the opposite.  The problem Kirk tells his former captors is that they made war easy.  War is supposed to be horrible that is why we try to avoid it.  By turning it into a simple inconvenience to society they have allowed the death toll to clime at an inconceivable rate resulting in millions or perhaps billions of death more than necessary.  Kirk concedes we all have a drive to kill but also power to put that drive aside.  Ambassador Fox finally redeems himself by offering his skills as a negotiator.  Kirk says that those on Vendikar are mostly likely just as terrified as they are.  Since they have a way to directly communicate with their high council they should use it to put an end to this destructive nightmare.   

In the end Fox stays behind to help the two planets sort this out. As the Enterprise leaves Kirk confides to Spock that he felt the duel terror that each planet felt in potentially losing their way of life and having real warfare come down would convince them both to come to the negotiation table.

Additional thoughts:  In the previous episode, “The Return of the Archons,” Kirk and Spock discuss the Prime Directive briefly and Kirk quickly dismisses it.  He does so under a technicality that a society with all actions being governed by a computer was not “developing” so the Prime Directive did not apply.   In later episodes Captain Kirk will use another technicality of prior interference that needs correcting.

Neither of those is the case here and I would go so far to say that this is the only time Kirk directly violates Prime Directive.  You can try to make excuses and blame Fox for creating the situation or invoke the right of self-defense when Anan and the rest of Eminar tried to kill the crew of the Enterprise.   Those excuses however can only be used to justify Kirk doing just enough to rescue the Ambassador and get back to the Enterprise and have an escape.  Kirk goes much farther than that he is altering the course of two neighboring worlds with a shared history.  He demands they change at gunpoint or he will destroy their civilization himself.  Captain Kirk has decided that there is something about this developing society that he does not like and has decided to change it, so much for the Prime Directive.

 It should be noted that when this episode was written World War II had only been over for a couple of decades.  So it was living memory of cities of Europe and Asia that were left in ruin with hardly stone on top of stone.  Not only had the human cost been enormous but the structural costs were debilitating and interfering with long-term recovery.   So the idea of being able to fight war without knocking buildings over just killing people started to become more popular.  The military even developed a type of weapon to do just that called the Neutron Bomb, although it was never used.  Kirk points out in this episode that such an idea is conceivably worse than traditional war.  Since traditional war saps resources it demands to be ended, war that preserves resources is like added fuel to fire it allows the burning to continue with a long term greater human cost.

Dresden

Tokyo 

Another critique of 20th century society that this episode explores is the state of modem American warfare that was still relatively young when this episode aired and has unfortunately continued on for the last fifty years.  From the US Civil War to the end of World War II the United States method of waging war was conducted under the theory of Total War.  When the entire society was committed to the conflict that was complete with a draft, resource rationing, and war bond sales.  All in an effort to ensure victory for the United States with the complete and unconditional surrender of the enemy.  Then in the aftermath of World War II the Iron Curtin fell and the Cold War was on.  A war without direct battles but two powers locked in conflict with nuclear missiles always aimed at one other with the promise of mutual assured destruction.  Proxy wars would be fought in Korea and Vietnam, and with President Johnson not wanting to interfere with his social programs promised that the United States could produce “butter and guns” and wage a military conflict without civilian sacrifice.  

In the decades since this episode aired it has only gotten worse.  There is no draft and the country can engage in multiple military conflicts without effecting the civilian population in any which way.  Modern war in the second half of the 20^th century would become the exclusive burden on military families.  As we began the 21^st century those families would be tossed around in our federal budget like any other causal expense.  In 2006 many soldiers were forced to buy their own equipment and their families had to send them armor because it wasn’t in our war budget to provide it for them.  Also during the second Iraq war in the late 2000s military caskets would be returned home under cover of darkness and out of sight so not to disturb the civilian population.  I want to point out I am writing this as a lifelong civilian. 

Back to the episode however, it is a tad disappointing that the limits of an hour long program prevented us from getting a full look at Eminiar society that would have been fascinating to examine.  They have reduced war deaths in their society to a simple sacrifice that must continue in order to preserve their culture.   This reminds me of how we as a society tend to view car accidents.  We see cars correctly as necessary part of our transportation infrastructure that allows a twenty to twenty-first century economy.  The price however is accidents are fairly frequent and deaths are even common.  I was in a car accident myself when I was sideswiped last December.  It was the second one in my life where both cars were moving.  Everyone I know has lost at least one relative.  I have lost an uncle in 2003 and a cousin in 2016. 

Yet we try to prevent car accidents and we work to make cars safer.  This war went on for 500 years and they just keep plugging.  I imagine Eminiar literature probably focuses a lot on this continuing sacrifice.   Providing heroes that the condemned can identify with, characters who want to live but realize they must report or the world as they know and love will soon be destroyed.  “What type of person would put their own life and self-interest against the survival of the planet?”  Their cinema must have horror movies that star sympathetic people who don’t want to die who end up bringing down the hellfire.  “The Man Who Didn’t Report” is a film that terrifies audiences everywhere.     

Captain Kirk is never disciplined for his actions in this episode despite the clear Prime Directive violation.  In one of the novels, and I forget which one, they were talking about this case it was explained that officials for the United Federation of Planets were so horrified at the millions who walked willing to their death in disintegration chambers for five straight centuries they simply turned the other way.

FINAL GRADE  5 of 5