[net.startrek] Not answering distress signals

alcmist@ssc-vax.UUCP (Frederick Wamsley) (04/18/85)

One proposed "solution" to the Kobayashi Maru training exercise was
to ignore the distress signal.

Neglecting a distress signal is obviously a violation of regulations,
tradition, and ethics  --
but there is precedent.

In Friday's Child, the Klingons try to lure the Enterprise away from
the planet with faked distress signals.  They succeed in getting 
Scotty to leave orbit - ONCE.  The second time the Klingons tried
that particular trick, Scotty ignored the distress signal, even 
though it was supposedly from a ship known to be in the area!

If hostile forces were in the habit of using spurious distress signals
to decoy starships, I'd expect a policy of not answering distress 
signals from inside the neutral zone (and forbidding civilian ships
to approach it).

Fred Wamsley
-- 
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