www.ditl.org

I'd agree 100%, except we've never seen special forces - at best, we had Picard, Worf, and Crusher(!) performing a black ops mission, and at worst, we had special-ed forces guarding the array at AR-558.

Naa, we did get a chance to see Starfleet Special Forces in action. RED SQUADRION!!!

God help us all

Then the point is even more important that there be some group there to handle missions that SF normally tries to foul up.

Indeed, the Federation military needs a total re-design. It's completely inadequate.

Its won every war it fought in. So while it could be better it is more than up to the task set for it.

That really says more about their enemies than for their martial prowess. While they're sufficient to defend the Federation from attack, they take unnecessary losses while doing so.

The point here being, to back into an agreement with Deep, is that development of strike "aircraft"/fighters should be done; but it should be done as part of the development of a true planetside-based military arm.

I don't see SF building a standing army. Not that any army they build would be much use.

I don't think a true standing army would be necessary - more like a small spec-ops cadre for the few missions (like AR-558) that require boots on the ground with more training and ability than standard Starfleet security.

Even a division worth would be great. Working from capital ships that have large shuttle counts.

Most Starfleet Officers seem pretty adept at hand to hand combat - how many times have we seen the Klingons get their testicles handed to them by humans in a fight (do Klingons have a pair of redundant testicles, like they do some other body organs? - a trifle unsporting, but a well aimed upswipe with a batleth wouldn't half ruin your enemies chances at procreation).

In anycase, I'd reckon all that was really needed was for a portion of Starfleet to be given a bit of extra weapons training, and some decent combat tactics taught to the Command Crew.

They should create something similar to the MACOs: a dedicated ground-assault unit placed on every large ship that can actualy fight somewhat competantly that can take over ground missions.

Teaos wrote:Its won every war it fought in. So while it could be better it is more than up to the task set for it.

It almost certainly lost the Tomed Incident, and the Cardassian War probably ended in a stalemate, given the terms of the respective treaties.

Mikey wrote:I don't think a true standing army would be necessary - more like a small spec-ops cadre for the few missions (like AR-558) that require boots on the ground with more training and ability than standard Starfleet security.

While control of space would be the decisive factor in any campaign, boots on the ground would still be necessary in large numbers. Special Forces can't hold captured territory in the same way that masses of conventional infantry can - there would never be enough of them to do the every day jobs like patroling the streets, manning roadblocks, and kicking down doors.

Rochey wrote:They should create something similar to the MACOs: a dedicated ground-assault unit placed on every large ship that can actualy fight somewhat competantly that can take over ground missions.

Agreed. A platoon or company per ship should suffice. That doesn't, however, remove the need for divisional-scale formations and above for planetary assaults and occupations.

It almost certainly lost the Tomed Incident, and the Cardassian War probably ended in a stalemate, given the terms of the respective treaties.

And it would have lost the Dominion War had the Klingons and Romulans not joined in. And they were losing against the Klingons in the YE alternate universe.

Agreed. A platoon or company per ship should suffice. That doesn't, however, remove the need for divisional-scale formations and above for planetary assaults and occupations.

Of course it doesn't. I'm just saying that something like that would be a good idea for all those ground missions that starship crews seem to go on.

And it would have lost the Dominion War had the Klingons and Romulans not joined in.

I believe the saying is "clear and present danger" SF seemed to be more than up to the task of fighting off any reasonable threat to it. The Dominion was not a resonable threat since the Federation hadnt heard about them and only had a couple of years to prepare.