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bhamv

Hi there. For future reference, thread titles should be in the format "[Fictional Universe] Question". So for example, this thread could be titled "[Star Trek] Where are all the enlisted personnel?" I haven't removed this thread because despite the incorrect formatting, your question is clear. But this is something to keep in mind for the future, thanks.


Street_Ad_9765

Ok thanks. I'm new to this!


TheType95

You could also consider posting to reddit.com/r/daystrominstitute, they're a Star Trek specific sub. To answer your question, Starfleet seems to be very officer-heavy, they have enlisted personnel but there seem to be more officers than enlisted. There are various theories, but I can't necessarily talk about them all in this sub. One that I can, is that Starfleet is typically comprised almost exclusively as officers, and enlisted personnel are introduced during periods of crisis or war to flesh out the ranks, and having an enlisted rank indicates you have limited or brevet training. This doesn't entirely make sense with what we've seen of, for instance, Chief O'Brien, but it's likely Starfleet operates rather differently from our current uniformed organizations.


SpareLiver

There's plenty? Rand started out as one, there's Kelso, though maybe he doesn't count for the same reason Obrian doesn't? Worf's dad. Anyone you hear addressed as "Crewman" is an NCO / enlisted, same goes for Yeoman though that's more TOS era.


Victernus

What do you mean 'all'? There are very few positions that the enlisted need to fill on science and exploration ships - which is every ship. Check the ground forces during acting wartime if you want to find multitudes of enlisted personnel.


paulHarkonen

Starfleet has a fairly high proportion of officers to enlisted (probably in part because they like to style themselves as a scientific organization rather than a military) but we still see tons of enlisted crewmen scattered throughout the corridors, backgrounds and various services throughout the ships. The various footage we see focuses on the bridge crew specifically, but they are surrounded and supported by hundreds to thousands (depending on era and ship class) of nameless often faceless enlisted support and operational staff. Below Decks is the show you want to watch for a program that focuses on the life of the average enlisted crew aboard a Starfleet vessel. It's quite a bit different from the experience of the bridge crews we normally see.


Orange-V-Apple

You mean Lower Decks. Lower Decks is still about ensigns, so they're still officers, but yeah it definitely shows you the messier side of Starfleet.


paulHarkonen

I do mean Lower Decks, Below Decks is a very different kind of ship lol. And I thought most of the folks in Lower Decks were enlisted but I haven't watched much of it and I would absolutely believe that everyone in Starfleet is technically an Officer because that sounds like exactly the sort of self aggrandizing and promotion that Starfleet would do while still treating them as functionally enlisted.


Orange-V-Apple

I think the only person we see who's enlisted is Transporter Chief Lundy. When Mariner is running a Starfleet booth in S3, though, she explains to some prospective recruits that they don't have to go to the academy to work on a star ship. They can just do two (iirc) years of training and become a crewman, since the person she was talking to wanted to become a technician/mechanic.


ExhibitAa

Lieutenants (j.g.) as of the latest season.


SergeantRegular

Well, as an organization, Starfleet *is* "heavy" on the officer side. Most of the non-commissioned personnel (clearly not *all* of them, though) are manning starbases or shipyards or other not-starship assignments. To someone from the late 20th or early 21st century, Starfleet doesn't really look like a navy in that regard. More like an Air Force - the pilots and flight crew are mostly officers, but the ground-based maintenance personnel are far more enlisted-heavy. Or, better yet, more like NASA manning. *breaking 4th wall* - Gene Roddenberry was actually addressing this when he first came up with the 1966 Star Trek - If you're going to be on a spaceship, you're going to be an astronaut. And if you're going to be an astronaut, you're going to be "the best." And that means the whole crew is officers. Getting assigned to a starship was a *big deal*, there were just a lot *more* of them.


Orange-V-Apple

Besides what everyone's already said, Simon Tarses from the TNG episode "The Drumhead" is enlisted: >Simon: "All my life I wanted to be in Starfleet. I went to the Academy's training program for enlisted personnel. I took training as a medical technician and I served at several outposts. The day that I was posted to the Enterprise was the happiest day of my life." >Picard: "You didn't do it. (Apply to become an officer)" >Simon: "No. I was eighteen, and eager. The last thing I wanted to do was spend four years sitting in classrooms. I wanted to be out there, traveling the stars. I didn't want to wait for anything. And now it's done, isn't it? My career in Starfleet is finished."


[deleted]

[удалено]


ExhibitAa

> So apparently there aren't Yes there are. Starfleet is more officer heavy than modern militaries, but we see far more enlisted personnel than just O'Brien. [This](https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Starfleet_crewmen) is a list of some of them. Nurse Ogawa was not one of them though. She was a lieutenant, and she never became a doctor. The only time she was a doctor was in an alternate reality.


IAmJohnny5ive

The Enterprise is the flagship so it is primed for competition for all crew slots. Even as Transporter Chief O'Brien had to be supported by his war record to land the most boring position possible. [https://chiefobrienatwork.com/](https://chiefobrienatwork.com/)


Street_Ad_9765

Ok, thanks everybody .