The Final Frontier of Civil-Military Relations

The Star Trek franchise’s premise, in which explorers “boldly go where no one has gone before” while keeping the peace among disparate peoples, speaks to a Kennedy-era idealism about the future. The United Federation of Planets is modeled on the United Nations, with governing bodies like the Supreme Assembly and the Federation Council; its charter defines its goal as the universal pursuit of peace. Starfleet — the Federation’s “armed peace-keeping force” — reports to the Federation Council, which is based on the Security Council of the United Nations and can be overruled only by the unanimous vote of the Supreme Assembly.¹ Initially filmed against the backdrop of the Cold War, Star Trek has allowed creator Gene Roddenberry and his successors to explore civil-military relations, the problem of terrorism as a political tool, and the militarization of American society.

The Federation’s structure creates tension between military and civilian leadership. Starfleet reports to a committee dominated by five permanent members, supplemented by six rotating temporary members. The resulting conflicts between Federation civilian and military leaders are portrayed on screen. For example, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982) hints at conflict between civilian scientists and military leaders through the character of Admiral James T. Kirk’s son, scientist David Marcus. Alluding to the fraught relationship between scientists at American universities and the Department of Defense, Marcus argues that “scientists have always been pawns of the military.” He does not trust Starfleet, because he fears officers like Kirk will turn a terraforming technology like Project Genesis into a weapon capable of wiping out entire planets. Marcus’s fears seem confirmed when Commander Pavel Chekov claims under duress that Kirk ordered the crew of USS Reliant to seize the equipment and documentation related to Genesis.²

Star Trek: Into Darkness (2013) more directly exposes the tension between civilian and military leaders. It was produced at the height of the post-9/11 Global War on Terror, and it criticizes the use of drones to attack targets in unaligned or enemy territory. Khan Noonien Singh launches a terrorist attack on Starfleet’s archives and headquarters, and he then flees into remote areas outside of Federation control. Admiral Alexander Marcus³ orders Kirk and the crew of the Enterprise to launch missile attacks on Khan’s refuge within the Klingon Empire from the edge of Federation space, but Spock argues that Starfleet regulations do not permit the execution of Federation citizens without trial. Kirk responds by personally leading a mission to capture Khan on Kronos. This results in the capture of Kirk’s away team, creating an international incident with the potential of escalating into a wider conflict.

Kirk’s decision to find an alternate way to bring Khan to justice via a ground attack on Kronos highlights the potential wider problems posed by U.S. raids to kill or capture terrorist leaders like Osama bin Laden. If the attack on bin Laden’s compound in May 2011 had failed and U.S. personnel had been captured, it would have endangered U.S. relations with its ally Pakistan and led to international embarrassment. Furthermore, the revelation that Admiral Marcus had awakened Khan to use him against the Klingons reveals his disregard for civilian leaders in setting Federation military policy by covertly working around them for his own ends.⁴

The twin themes of civil-military relations and terrorism are also explored in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991), an allegory addressing the end of the Cold War through the guise of the Federation and the Klingon Empire. The Klingon Empire’s situation mirrors that of the Soviet Union under Mikhail Gorbachev, with a society crippled by unsupportable military expenditures and extreme environmental crises (the analogue for Chernobyl being the destruction of the Klingon Empire’s mining world Praxis). A cabal of Klingon and Starfleet officers, desperate to maintain their cold war, assassinate the Klingon Chancellor and attempt to kill the Federation President. Released one year after Alexander Shmonov attempted to kill Gorbachev during the 1990 October Revolution Parade in Red Square, the movie reflected the confusing reality of the end of the Cold War, as both Americans and Soviets struggled with the reality of Communism’s collapse.⁵

Star Trek provides a relatable context for analysis of civil-military relations and the challenge of understanding and combating terrorism by shifting its narrative frame from the present to a mythic future. This allows the franchise to discuss the Cold War and the Global War on Terror in a manner more palatable to its audiences. Writers and directors are often so good at this narrative shift that viewers often perceive Star Trek as being apolitical, leading to complaints when it seems to stray into immediately relevant cultural critiques. Despite this, Star Trek has long reflected real-world debates about the militarization of society and the ethical dilemmas posed by changing military technologies and tactics.

1. Franz Joseph, Star Trek Star Fleet Technical Manual (New York: Ballantine Books, 1975), 01:00–01:19.
2. Joy Rodhe, “Gray Matters: Social Scientists, Military Patronage, and Democracy in the Cold War,” Journal of American History 96 (2009), 99–122.
3. Alexander Marcus is the father of Carol Marcus, who in the “Prime” timeline has a child with James T. Kirk — the David Marcus of Star Trek II. However, Into Darkness is set in an alternate timeline (the “Kelvin” timeline), and it is unknown whether Carol Marcus and James Kirk have a child in that timeline.
4. Forrest Wickman, “Star Trek Into Due Process: The Sequel’s Message About Drones, Militarization, and Blowback,” Slate, May 17, 2013.
5. Joshua M. Patton, “The Undiscovered Country Is Star Trek’s Most Timeless Story,” CBR, June 4, 2023; Yevgeny Levkovich, “The last Soviet terrorist: The man who tried to assassinate Gorbachev,” Russia Beyond, February 16, 2017.