queenhank Posted January 25, 2006 Share Posted January 25, 2006 NCOs form the backbone of most Western military organizations, which Starfleet's organizational structure is modeled after. Typically NCOs serve as administrative personnel, as advisors to the officer corps, and as both supervisors of, and advocates for, the lower-ranking enlisted personnel. Many of them often serve as NCOs for the majority of their career. The knowledge and experience they accumulate makes them vital components of their respective services. O'Brien as a career NCO would have been the rule rather than the exception. I'm sorry, all I know of military rank I learned from Star Trek. Does that prove or disprove what I said? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steveo Posted January 25, 2006 Share Posted January 25, 2006 Well' date=' to be accurate, O'Brian was never an officer. He's an enlisted man, and as such is technically below the rank of ensign (but I'd like to see Nog try to make him salute).[/quote'] To be fair, I'd like to see Nog think he should make hom salute. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenebrae Posted January 25, 2006 Share Posted January 25, 2006 NCOs form the backbone of most Western military organizations' date=' which Starfleet's organizational structure is modeled after. Typically NCOs serve as administrative personnel, as advisors to the officer corps, and as both supervisors of, and advocates for, the lower-ranking enlisted personnel. Many of them often serve as NCOs for the majority of their career. The knowledge and experience they accumulate makes them vital components of their respective services. O'Brien as a career NCO would have been the rule rather than the exception. [/quote'] You've entirely missed my point - I'm not suggesting that he was atypical, I'm merely pointing out that you'd think a better way to recognise the superior knowledge of the NCOs would have been developed... rather than having him cowtow to comissioned officers still wet behind the ears. I'm sure if there is any decent it shall be "it's been like that for hundreds of years". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mav Posted January 25, 2006 Share Posted January 25, 2006 Age has nothing to do with rank, in Star Trek. Know why? Go back and rewatch TNG. If you look in the background while scenes go on you see officers and crew right. It's not uncommon to spot an elderly man or woman, in uniform, with a rank not much higher than Lt. Jr or Ensign. And we're talking people who have gray hair and balding (older than Picard even). Sure they might have "just" joined Starfleet in the last four or five years but I highly doubt you'd find a man in his fifties or sixties going through the Academy along side fresh recruits no older than seventeen or eightteen. Maybe one or two people could put up with being that old in such a youthful place but as I said rewatch TNG, you see multiple elderly people and it's not just the same extra it's different ones. They all couldnt have pulled a Cocoon on us and gone into the Academy at such an old age ;o So they obviously have been in Starfleet a while and haven't advanced as much. When someone one third of your age is a senior officer on the bridge or even something as high as First Officer, that shows ya age don't mean anything in Trek. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenebrae Posted January 25, 2006 Share Posted January 25, 2006 If that's addressed toward my point - then I don't see the relevance. O'Brien has got pretty much as far as he can go unless he transfers to command. They could just give O'Brien and some of his mates a Defiant to mess around in, that would be highlarious. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
queenhank Posted January 25, 2006 Share Posted January 25, 2006 Also possible that those elderly ensigns were enlisted, and after a lifetime of experience, became comissioned officers, like O'Brian could have done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mav Posted January 26, 2006 Share Posted January 26, 2006 Forgive my ignorance, I'm ashamed I don't know this as a Trekkie but what is the difference between an "enlisted" officer and comissioned officers? I didn't really notice them even mentioned in TOS or TNG, I mean they were there but like I didn't even pay them any attention when it came up. I did however notice O'Brien talk about how he was "glad he was just enlisted" in a DS9 episode from season 3, all the senior officers had to go to a formal dinner and he didnt have too, since he was enlisted. I assume they are just like grunt workers who hold a honorary rank? I know O'Brien was Cheif Petty Officer but he had the technical skills to be a Chief Engineer on a starship. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maverick Posted January 26, 2006 Share Posted January 26, 2006 maybe the positions on voyager carry the ranks. harry remained an ensign because there was nowhere to promote him to and there is a chain of command to consider. b'elanna was a maquis so was unable to hold a starfleet rank. this logic holds a lot of water if you dont think about how many crew died throughout the 7 years. there would have been space for promotion. perhaps it nothing to do with janeway but to do with the writers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenebrae Posted January 26, 2006 Share Posted January 26, 2006 Now you're sounding like me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrDad Posted January 26, 2006 Share Posted January 26, 2006 Forgive my ignorance, I'm ashamed I don't know this as a Trekkie but what is the difference between an "enlisted" officer and comissioned officers? I didn't really notice them even mentioned in TOS or TNG, I mean they were there but like I didn't even pay them any attention when it came up. I did however notice O'Brien talk about how he was "glad he was just enlisted" in a DS9 episode from season 3, all the senior officers had to go to a formal dinner and he didnt have too, since he was enlisted. I assume they are just like grunt workers who hold a honorary rank? I know O'Brien was Cheif Petty Officer but he had the technical skills to be a Chief Engineer on a starship. Officers in general non-comissioned officer (NCO) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenebrae Posted January 26, 2006 Share Posted January 26, 2006 Actually, now I think about it - O'Brien pretty much got a massive promotion for DS9. He went from transporter button pusher to chief engineer of the most important space station [sisko shouty] IN THE ENTIRE ALPHA QUADRANT![/sisko shouty] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
queenhank Posted January 26, 2006 Share Posted January 26, 2006 Well, if you think about it, he didn't. He went from Transporter Chief on the Flagship of the Federation to Chief Engineer on quite probably the LEAST important space station in the Alpha Quadrant. He was, essentially, given a reprieve from travelling around the stars, in exchange for rebuilding, almost from scratch, an old, busted-up Cardassian processing facility, and making it into a Federation facility. It wasn't until a while AFTER he got the job that the wormhole was discovered, and DS9 became an important place. He probably saw the job as partial retirement when he took it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenebrae Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 Damn you queenhank :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hilander72 Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 I've found some evidence (canon) that O'Brien's move to DS9 is a step down to NCO. (picture grabbed from) TNG 3x23 Sarek I could have quoted half this thread, but I didn't feel that was necessary. :) If I remember correctly I belive the reason for Miles to get a cush job was his family and nothing else, but I could be wrong. That would also explain why he'd step down to NCO, but is still recognized by the officers at DS9 as an equal, despite his NCO rank. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TetsuoShima Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 Yes, those would seem to be luitenant pips, but they aren't... During the earlier seasons of TNG, ordinary pips were also used for NCO's. The pips on O'Briens collar in that picture would make him a "Master Chief Petty Officer", which would still be one rank higher than the rank he held in DS9 which was "Senior Chief Petty Officer". So although he wasn't demoted to noncom, he was still demoted appearently... According to wikipedia, he should have had one full and one half pip to be a Senior Chief Petty Officer. One explanation could be that higher noncoms held positions similar to commissioned officers and were treated equally, it might be possible that they did away with this concept to let it have a more 'close-to-home' feeling to it in DS9, even though it would seem that O'Brien was indeed being treated fairly equally... Since allready in the beginning of DS9, O'brien wears a different insignia, the single half pip, which would rank him on TNG as maximum "petty officer 1st class".... It's all very confusing and not very logical... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenebrae Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 If you watch the credits for Star Trek, there is a guy credited for continuity - he must have been asleep most of the time. Anyway, I think O'Brien did want that more... sedentry life with the family and out of the reach of the dangerous energy fields that followed the Enterprise around. That's why he moves to Earth, one assumes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maverick Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 can no-one accept that there may be thing that the writers just didnt think of? i.e. the ranking system. i wondered at o'briens rank when he got to DS9 but put it down to a simple lack of planning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenebrae Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 *GASP* Until you mentioned it, I had never ever thought that Trek writers could be wrong! :| Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
queenhank Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 can no-one accept that there may be thing that the writers just didnt think of? i.e. the ranking system. i wondered at o'briens rank when he got to DS9 but put it down to a simple lack of planning. Highly doubtful, actually. I mean, when was the last time such an error was made? Chances are, there is somebody (or rather, was) at Paramount who knows exactly how the ranking system works, and just hasn't seen fit to, you know, publish a book on it yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenebrae Posted January 28, 2006 Share Posted January 28, 2006 I'm just waiting for the paperback "Queenhank explains every continuity "error" in Trek ever." I'm guessing it'll sell a lot of copies because of the money back guarntee. ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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