RTaylor@RADC-MULTICS.ARPA (08/04/84)
From: " Roz " <RTaylor@RADC-MULTICS.ARPA>
For what it's worth:
In recent history (last 10 years or so), general officers (U.S.
Army sticks in my mind) who ***spoke*** out against the administration
were not court martialed (of course, they hadn't stolen anything quite
so valuable as a starship). These poor (?) fellows spoke their minds
and opinions which happened to be countrary to government (stated)
policy. Normally, what happens is he is offered a new assignment which
is drastically below his current assignment, in prestige,
responsibility, etc. (For example, a 2-star general might be offerred a
1-star's job...not good!) Normally, the erring officer then exercises
his option to retire rather than accept the "down-grade" assignment.
In worse offenses (like speaking your mind and saying the President
was wrong, but not treason, murder, etc), the service has been known to
give the officer the option: you may retire, or you may have a court
martial...the option is only given when the service is concerned about
the image of its officer corps or its own image.
Because discipline is so very important during war, the Services
have to demand discipline during non-wartime to ensure it is available
when needed. This leads to a variety of responses to non-capital
offenses during peace time, from verbal reprimands to courts
martial...lest we forget, capital punishment is still a viable
punishment for a court to award...although there are regulations saying
which offenses can use capital punishment. (It has been a long time
since anyone was executed for it, but rape is still punishible by death
under court martial regulations!)
Although the public may not know or realize it, most officers in any
branch of US Service (and probably the enlisted personnel even better)
can read between the lines and see the disciplinary action in most cases
(which are publicized). And, for that reason the military community
understands or knows what is going on, even if the general public
doesn't. For example, several years ago an Army general in Hawaii came
out on at least two occasions and said in polite politicalese that the
President's policy in a particular area was wrong...the first time he
made a public apology...30 days after the last one he announced his
retirement!
Sorry about the lesson on military justice...the bottom line is,
that I feel Starfleet would consider the above and come out with
something like the following; probably playing on Kirk's "officership":
"For the good of the corps, discipline must be maintained!" I think
a court martial would be required for Admiral Kirk, unless he were a
hero in the public's eye. In that case, he would be offerred his choice
of retirement or some very obscure underling job somewhere....[and once
you've tasted power it is hard to go without it!]
Flames and discussions on this topic can and should be addressed to
me at my EMAIL address: rtaylor at radc-multics
Rozayers@convex.UUCP (08/14/84)
#R:sri-arpa:-74000:convex:42100006:000:196 convex!ayers Aug 14 14:47:00 1984 Or how about the old standby that saves face for all: We are announcing that Kirk and crew were on secret mission all along. or didn't you see the FIRST cloaking device story????? blues, II