Section 31 and Star Trek

There's a brand new Star Trek movie out, it's called Section 31 and stars Michelle Yeoh. And I have not seen it and probably will not. This isn't an outraged fan boycott, I didn't have much interest in the project when it was announced, and nothing I've seen since has grabbed my attention and made me reconsider. Many people don't like it, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't, I just have more things to occupy my free time.

Instead of talking about the movie, I am interested in discussing the focus (I assume it's the focus, since it's the title) of the movie, the titular Section 31. Section 31 is a shadowy and unethical intelligence service affiliated with the Federation and is quite old. It first appeared in Deep Space Nine, and there's a subplot in Enterprise that places them or a precursor were running in the days before the Federation was officially founded.

I liked the idea and execution of them in Deep Space Nine, so I'm not opposed to them getting a movie/show focused on them. Though I have seen the quote by Alex Kurtzman who is essentially running the modern Star Trek franchise and I find it depressing and alarming. 

In order for that vision to exist, in order for the light to exist, you need people who operate in the shadows. And it's a yin and yang. You can't have one without the other.

I'm struggling to figure out where to start with what's wrong with this view of the show and frankly in general.  I don't agree that the Federation of Star Trek is a Utopia, I know it feels like one compared to our quite troubled lives and world, but they're not the same thing. The people of the Federation and the crews of the ships we watch on TV have struggles and imperfections and flaws, both as individuals and as societies. They accomplished much and made significant progress in many areas that our real societies are in danger of backsliding on. But, importantly, that progress was shown to have taken years of hard work and sacrifice, and in a number of episodes is challenged and shown to be not as advanced or as secure as first thought.

I agree that Rodenberry and Fontana et al. created a franchise and world that is optimistic, but its optimism isn't founded just on good feelings and naivety, as Kurtzman suggests with his views on the show. In the days of Kirk and Spock, the Klingons are an enemy and possibly existential threat to the Federation. By the end of the old period of Trek some 40 years later, the Klingons and Federation are allies and are working towards a stable and lasting peace and building a better relationship. That progress was shown throughout the movies, The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine. Those stories involved sacrifices, resources, ships and quick thinking. And it wasn't a path of uninterrupted progress, the path to peace was met with stiff opposition from both societies, and animosities and cultural misunderstandings would on occasion cause rifts and opportunities to exploit into renewed conflict.

Take away the make-up and costumes and turn the starships into naval vessels, and you have a fairly grounded show about tense situations and diplomacy. The message of Star Trek is essentially, these wonderful things can be ours too, if we try and commit to the undertaking.

So, then, where does Section 31 (S31) fit into this optimistic future of hard work and risk paying off in the long-term? Well, in the old Trek shows S31 was ultimately an antagonistic force, their first appearance is an episode where they subject a main character Doctor Bashir to interrogation, accusing him of being a traitor, which is revealed to be a form of job interview to recruit him into their operations. Bashir and the main cast are appalled at their methods and existence. 

They remain antagonistic and unscrupulous, another highlight of theirs was manipulating a rival power in the Romulans, in the process framing a Senator and getting her killed. They also engineered a bioweapon that infected the entirety of the Changelings, the leaders of the Dominion, another rival power. Their justification for existing is that they wish to protect the Federation and will do "whatever it takes" to get the job done. S31 is ultimately destroyed in Deep Space Nine, and peace between the Dominion and the Federation is reached when a cure for the disease S31 created and is given to the Dominion.

I'm glossing over many things in this short recap, the important thing to understand is that S31 despite their justifications are not a Yang to the Federation's Yin, they're out of control and needed to be destroyed and its existence and relationship to the Federation was a stain on the latter. Some fans make excuses for the disease that infects and will kill an entire species because of the actions of the Founders and the Dominion, which to be clear were horrific. No sympathy or tears for them, but, but, the reason they're so horrifically awful is because of a history of them being on the receiving end of actions like S31's. Their actions are justified on the assumption that someone will poison them all if given the chance, so they make sure they never give anyone a chance. And what stops the war in the end ultimately isn't the cure itself, it's being given the means to save themselves and finally being convinced that some aliens might be trustworthy to a degree after all.

Again, achieving that result took multiple seasons and an intergalactic war. S31 did nothing to prevent the conflict nor did their weapon actively stop it once it started, it'd just increased the body count. And to give new Star Trek its due, this lead to what's known as "blowback". In the third season of Star Trek Picard, the antagonists are a small group of Founders who were experimented on by S31 to develop that weapon. They did not forgive nor forget, and embarked on a plot that nearly wiped out the entirety of the Federation. 

Apart from being good television, this plot line reveals something about S31, like groups in fiction and reality. The "dirty but necessary" and "pragmatic" option often creates more problems than it solves. If you believe that S31s actions during the war with the Dominion were necessary, then at best they traded one existential threat for another down the line. Or like how the CIA and MI6 leant support to the movement to overthrow Prime Minister Mossaddegh in Iran in 1953 which kept the Shah in power and the oil flowing, and also cemented the West as hostile powers for Iran's reformers and strengthened the reactionary clergy (who also supported the downfall of Mossaddegh) contributing heavily to the rise of the Islamic Republic which is still a headache for Washington to this day.

Or how the Russian security services in the 1990s targetted and killed Chechen and other nationalist leaders in the Caucuses while provided support to Islamist rivals to split their opposition has now led to a large and very dangerous current of Islamic terrorist movements including affiliates of Islamic State. Or how the Russian Federation intervened in Syria to assist the Assad dictatorship in the brutal destruction of democratic opposition forces and brutalise the wider population into submission, only to galvanise the majority of Syrians into supporting an offensive that toppled Assad and expelled Russian forces from the country, led by a group that was previously affiliated with Al-Qaeda.

Again, I have not watched the S31 movie, and perhaps it is unfair to have written this without doing so, but I don't see how someone who thinks S31 as it existed in both old and new trek is necessary for the good things in Star Trek to exist would produce something that would add to this subject in a way that's meaningful and in keeping with the wider Star Trek vision.

I will say I like this poster, does it fit Star Trek? No. Does it suit a hypothetical Section 31 movie that does the topic justice? Also, no. Does Michelle Yeoh look cool as hell? Yes.