"...Your last so-called World War."

[JonnyQuest037]

A discussion about the Eugenics Wars over in the Unpopular Opinions thread made me decide to look up exactly what was established about them in "Space Seed." We're given just a few tantalizing references, giving us a rough outline of the war(s), but it seems fairly clear that they were pretty devastating. (Pertinent dialogue quoted below, with certain lines bolded for emphasis.)

SPOCK: Records of that period are fragmentary, however. The mid-1990s was the era of your last so-called World War.
MCCOY: The Eugenics Wars.
SPOCK: Of course. Your attempt to improve the race through selective breeding.
MCCOY: Now, wait a minute. Not our attempt, Mister Spock. A group of ambitious scientists. I'm sure you know the type. Devoted to logic, completely unemotional--

KIRK: There are a great many unanswered questions about those years.
SPOCK: A strange, violent period in your history. I find no record what so ever of an SS Botany Bay. Captain, the DY-100 class vessel was designed for interplanetary travel only. With simple nuclear-powered engines, star travel was considered impractical at that time. It was ten thousand to one against their making it to another star system. And why no record of the trip?
KIRK: Botany Bay... That was the name of a penal colony on shores of Australia, wasn't it? If they took that name for their vessel--
SPOCK: If you're suggesting this was a penal deportation vessel, you've arrived at a totally illogical conclusion.
KIRK: Oh?
SPOCK: Your Earth was on the verge of a dark ages. Whole populations were being bombed out of existence. A group of criminals could have been dealt with far more efficiently than wasting one of their most advanced spaceships.
KIRK: Yes. So much for my theory. I'm still waiting to hear yours.

KIRK: Would you estimate him to be a product of selective breeding?
SPOCK: There is that possibility, Captain. His age would be correct. In 1993, a group of these young supermen did seize power simultaneously in over forty nations.
KIRK: Well, they were hardly supermen. They were aggressive, arrogant. They began to battle among themselves.
SPOCK: Because the scientists overlooked one fact. Superior ability breeds superior ambition.
KIRK: Interesting, if true. They created a group of Alexanders, Napoleons.
SPOCK: I have collected some names and made some counts. By my estimate, there were some eighty or ninety of these young supermen unaccounted for when they were finally defeated.
KIRK: That fact isn't in the history texts.
SPOCK: Would you reveal to war-weary populations that some eighty Napoleons might still be alive?

KIRK: Forgive my curiosity, Mister Khan, but my officers are anxious to know more about your extraordinary journey.
SPOCK: And how you managed to keep it out of the history books.
KHAN: Adventure, Captain. Adventure. There was little else left on Earth.
SPOCK: There was the war to end tyranny. Many considered that a noble effort.
KHAN: Tyranny, sir? Or an attempt to unify humanity?
SPOCK: Unify, sir? Like a team of animals under one whip?
KHAN: I know something of those years. Remember, it was a time of great dreams, of great aspiration.
SPOCK: Under dozens of petty dictatorships.
KHAN: One man would have ruled eventually. As Rome under Caesar. Think of its accomplishments.
SPOCK: Then your sympathies were with--
KHAN: You are an excellent tactician, Captain. You let your second in command attack while you sit and watch for weakness.
KIRK: You have a tendency to express ideas in military terms, Mister Khan. This is a social occasion.
KHAN: It has been said that social occasions are only warfare concealed. Many prefer it more honest, more open.
KIRK: You fled. Why? Were you afraid?
KHAN: I've never been afraid.
KIRK: But you left at the very time mankind needed courage.
KHAN: We offered the world order!
KIRK: We?

KIRK: Khan Noonien Singh.
SPOCK: From 1992 through 1996, absolute ruler of more than a quarter of your world. From Asia through the Middle East.
MCCOY: The last of the tyrants to be overthrown.
SCOTT: I must confess, gentlemen. I've always held a sneaking admiration for this one.
KIRK: He was the best of the tyrants and the most dangerous. They were supermen, in a sense. Stronger, braver, certainly more ambitious, more daring.
SPOCK: Gentlemen, this romanticism about a ruthless dictator is
KIRK: Mister Spock, we humans have a streak of barbarism in us. Appalling, but there, nevertheless.
SCOTT: There were no massacres under his rule.
SPOCK: And as little freedom.
MCCOY: No wars until he was attacked.
SPOCK: Gentlemen.
KIRK: Mister Spock, you misunderstand us. We can be against him and admire him all at the same time.
SPOCK: Illogical.
KIRK: Totally.​

Now, it seems fairly clear that when "Space Seed" was written, the Eugenics Wars and WWIII were supposed to be one and the same thing. This was rather quickly retconned when The Next Generation came along in 1987, as I'd imagine that the mid-90s date given in "Space Seed" started to feel a little too close for comfort. So in "Encounter at Farpoint," we're told that WWIII took place in the 21st century, and that various factions controlled their military forces through narcotics. Eventually, enough details were added that it was clear that now WWIII was now considered to be an entirely separate thing from the Eugenics Wars, as WWIII took place from 2026 to 2053 and involved a nuclear exchange between nations.

On Memory Alpha, I found this intriguing theory:

In TOS: "Bread and Circuses", Spock states that eleven million people died in World War II. This, however, severely contradicts current data, which places the death toll anywhere from a low of twenty million (if only military is counted) to a high of over seventy million (if military and civilians are counted). Most counts settle on around fifty million or so.

Spock may have been referring solely to civilian casualties as a result of "slavery" and "despotism" rather than the total war itself. Eleven million is a number frequently given for civilian deaths solely from Nazi policies. This might explain a figure of six million that he gave for World War I, too, as that is about an average (slightly on the low side) estimate of civilian deaths out of a World War I total of about sixteen million.

I like this theory a lot, as it's a simple rationalization for the casualty numbers for WWI and WWII being so off. (And if there's one thing that Spock typically gets right, it's numbers.)

I also found it interesting to discover that, when I double-checked the dialogue from "Space Seed," they never actually refer to the Eugenics Wars as "World War III" in the episode. It's merely "the last of your so-called World Wars." This gives us another tantalizing possibility, that maybe there was another World War between WWII and the Eugenics Wars in the mid-1990s. Did the creators of "Space Seed" possibly envision Earth having a Third World War in the 70s or 80s, with WWIV happening in the 90s as the Eugenics Wars?

And in looking up info for this post, I learned that there was a deleted scene from "The Corbomite Maneuver" where it was implied that World War III was actually avoided after Earth came very close to it at the time of the "Sino-Western trouble."

What do you think, folks? How do you envision World War III and/or the Eugenics Wars as happening in the history of the TOS era? And do you consider them to be the same thing or not?

 

[Timo]

I'd like to accept the descriptions as given, but utterly dismiss Spock's Vulcan idea that Khan's Khonflict would be a "so-called world war" at all. Nobody agrees with him on that, after all; McCoy directly contradicts him, setting the record straight for this all-(super-)human conflict; and things are streamlined a lot by us dismissing the "so-called" bit.

The casualty figures given by Spock are not appropriate for any of the World Wars he lists, not even for the fictional one. In the pre-credits bit of "Space Seed", everybody was wrong, so Spock having an obscure naming detail of human history slightly off is fine, too. But generally Spock doesn't err, or if he does, he gets hotly contradicted by McCoy (just as in "Space Seed"). So those casualty figures probably are correct in some sense after all. And the distinction made above is a good one: "despotism" may have been behind each and every death in those wars, but "despotism of the sort that divides the world into masters and slaves" would give the desired numbers easily enough.

Of course, "Eugenics Wars" might be the collective name for all wars between 1937 and 2053, racial purity certainly being a common theme in these conflicts; the 1990s would simply fall within the "period of Eugenics Wars", making both Spock and McCoy literally correct.

That Earth dodged a Commies/Yankees conflict but did have a nuclear war complete with nuclear winter and all is IMHO just good reason to start making assumptions about the participants in that latter war, not a cause for any further anguish. It's trivial to say that no Communists were involved; whether no Yankees were involved, despite the US apparently having been a participant, takes more speculating, but might be rewarding as such.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[johnnybear]

Perhaps events have changed on earth due to temporal anomalies in the far future or even during after the return of Kirk's final mission?
JB

 

[ED-209]

The dates don't match up for it to be the same thing.

 

[Phaser Two]

I am no Encounter at Farpoint expert but I hated how First Contact retconned Earth history. In Star Trek, we were supposed to have gotten past all of the troubles, giving people hope. I do not understand to this day why TNG, of all shows, felt the need to change that.

 

[Farscape One]

I think it's because typically things gets worse before they get better.

 

[Damian]

I think it's because typically things gets worse before they get better.

That's how I took it. There is not a lot of canon information about WWIII but the impression I get from various episodes of that bring it up in TNG, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise (and even a few snippets in the original series) is that things hit rock bottom and it was after first contact with the Vulcans that we started turning things around. It makes sense. Sometimes you have to hit rock bottom before you realize a change has got to come.

We needed to learn from our mistakes first.

As to the question, I think initially during "Space Seed" that the intent was that the Eugenics Wars and WWIII was one in the same. I think "Bread and Circuses" is where a WWIII conflict is mentioned specifically for the first time. So at the very least by the time TNG comes out there is a 'canon' basis for there being a WWIII at all. Before TNG came out I generally assumed they were the same conflict.

However TNG and later shows make clear WWIII is a wholly separate conflict. I do believe it's a bit of a retcon. You can make in story arguments however to explain the differences. Before TNG there is so little information provided, just "Space Seed" and "Breads and Circuses" about a WWIII that it does leave at least some flexibility in interpreting things.

Nowadays I consider them separate conflicts. They specifically gave the years of the Eugenics Wars as 1992 to 1996. And we learn that WWIII ended in 2053 (I believe it was considered to have started in 2026, though I don't think that date is set in stone).

There are indications that WWIII has to do with some sort or eugenics as well though, judging by the Terra Prime episodes of Enterprise, and the snippet we saw of Colonel Green. That is also at least partially consistent with the non-canon novel "Federation" which features an Optimum Movement that has similar goals to the augments in the 1990s. The novelization for First Contact also gives some clues about WWIII.

Like the Romulan War, it is an event that has a significant impact on Star Trek's future history that has little information in canon. The Romulan War finally saw its story told in the novels. WWIII, however, has not seen much novel coverage. I'd love to see a novel depict that war in greater detail. Maybe working off some of the narrative Dayton Ward started in his novels beginning with "From History's Shadow" though "Elusive Salvation" since they cover the same period and maybe even some of the information provided in Greg Cox's "Eugenics Wars" novels (a great novel series BTW depicting how the Eugenics Wars actually happened and we just never new it ---the secrets out now thanks to Greg )

 

[JonnyQuest037]

I'd like to accept the descriptions as given, but utterly dismiss Spock's Vulcan idea that Khan's Khonflict would be a "so-called world war" at all. Nobody agrees with him on that, after all; McCoy directly contradicts him, setting the record straight for this all-(super-)human conflict; and things are streamlined a lot by us dismissing the "so-called" bit.

I just rewatched the scene, and the performances don't bear this out. DeForest Kelley nods after Nimoy says the line "the last of your so-called World Wars." It's a very slight nod, but it's definitely there. Kelley also says the line "The Eugenics Wars" totally calmly. McCoy isn't correcting Spock, he's agreeing with him and adding to his information. And the fact that Kirk doesn't bother to correct or tease Spock about getting something about Earth history wrong is also very telling.

Now look at McCoy when Spock then describes the Eugenics Wars as "Your attempt to improve the race through selective breeding." McCoy raises his voice slightly and leans forward, becoming ever-so-slightly more agitated. He's teasing Spock, because he has the remnants of a smile still on his face, but he's definitely disagreeing with him attributing the Eugenics Wars to all of humanity, rather than just a few misguided individuals.

The dates don't match up for it to be the same thing.

I'm asking if people accept the retcon that TNG introduced re: WWIII. Star Trek hasn't been 100% consistent throughout its 50+ year history, and I think it's silly to pretend it has been. I find it more illuminating to try and see what the original creator intent was. YMMV.

There is not a lot of canon information about WWIII but the impression I get from various episodes of that bring it up in TNG, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise (and even a few snippets in the original series) is that things hit rock bottom and it was after first contact with the Vulcans that we started turning things around. It makes sense. Sometimes you have to hit rock bottom before you realize a change has got to come.

We needed to learn from our mistakes first.

Yes, I like this concept, and it makes a lot of sense to me. It explains why humans and Vulcans are so prominent within the Federation and Starfleet, and it explains how humans pulled themselves out of the depths after they saw something bigger than themselves to strive for.

As to the question, I think initially during "Space Seed" that the intent was that the Eugenics Wars and WWIII was one in the same. I think "Bread and Circuses" is where a WWIII conflict is mentioned specifically for the first time. So at the very least by the time TNG comes out there is a 'canon' basis for there being a WWIII at all. Before TNG came out I generally assumed they were the same conflict.

According to Star Trek Script Search, you're right. "Bread and Circuses" is the first explicit mention of a World War III.

However TNG and later shows make clear WWIII is a wholly separate conflict. I do believe it's a bit of a retcon.

It's a huge retcon IMO, considering that they moved WWIII forward by 30 to 60 years. I understand why they did it, but it's still a pretty big change.

There are indications that WWIII has to do with some sort or eugenics as well though, judging by the Terra Prime episodes of Enterprise, and the snippet we saw of Colonel Green. That is also at least partially consistent with the non-canon novel "Federation" which features an Optimum Movement that has similar goals to the augments in the 1990s.

I love that novel. Still one of my absolute favorites.

I'd love to see a novel depict that war in greater detail. Maybe working off some of the narrative Dayton Ward started in his novels beginning with "From History's Shadow" though "Elusive Salvation" since they cover the same period and maybe even some of the information provided in Greg Cox's "Eugenics Wars" novels (a great novel series BTW depicting how the Eugenics Wars actually happened and we just never new it ---the secrets out now thanks to Greg )

If they ever tackle the Eugenics Wars in book form again, I'd like to see a different tack on it. Greg's concept of the Eugenics Wars as a secret conflict that lined up with our actual history was a really clever idea, but I'd still love to see a treatment of them that was closer to the original concept.

And if it incorporated such passingly-mentioned TOS dictators like Le Kwan, Krotus, Ferris, Maltuvis, or the scientist Stavos Keniclius from TAS, so much the better.

 

[Damian]

It's a huge retcon IMO, considering that they moved WWIII forward by 30 to 60 years. I understand why they did it, but it's still a pretty big change.

I'm not sure how huge it is. There are ways to explain it in story that make some sense, and indeed some of the novels have done that. It's certainly a retcon in intent I believe. But it wasn't a total retcon in the sense that even in the later shows they did leave the Eugenics Wars intact and didn't actually change that part of the story. They basically just moved WWIII to a different era.

 

[johnnybear]

Why do I feel that Krotus may have been a Klingon?
JB

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Why do I feel that Krotus may have been a Klingon?

It's certainly a Klingony-sounding name. And assuming that Garth was naming off the rulers he mentioned in chronological order, Krotus would be the most recent one and therefore the most likely one to have become notable after first contact with the Klingons.

All the others before me have failed. Alexander, Caesar, Napoleon, Hitler, Lee Kuan, Krotus! All of them are dust!

So yeah, let's say that Krotus is a Klingon. Headcanoned!

EDIT: Interestingly, Memory Beta says that Krotus was an Andorian in several licensed works.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

I wonder if perhaps "The Eugenics Wars" is what they were commonly called at the time, and they were just reclassified as "World War III" by historians a few decades later. Sort of like how after the 1940s, the war that was fought from 1914 to 1918 was no longer "The Great War" or "The War To End All Wars," it was just World War I. Spock, who presumably learned Earth history from a very formalized text, thinks of the wars involving Khan as "World War III." McCoy, who's more of a iconoclast and old-fashioned by nature, still calls them "The Eugenics Wars."

 

[Marsden]

I agree that World War III is kind of a blanket term for a period of war that affect most of the world like World War II is.

World War II wasn't just one war, many history books give different dates for it even. The Japanese invaded Manchuria in 1931 but then Second Sino Japanese war started in 1937 and didn't end until 1945. The European Theater was a completely different circumstance that most say started in 1939 with the invasion of Poland and France and England declaring war. Then you get the 1941 start date with Pearl Harbor. There's also The Winter War between the Soviets and Finland (1940), the Italian invasion of Ethiopia (1935) and Albania (1938), The Spanish Civil War (1936-39) in which many of the powers interfered and tested out weapons and tactics.

So when they say "The last of the tyrants to be overthrown." and "In 1993, a group of these young supermen did seize power simultaneously in over forty nations". we are obviously discussion several distinct conflicts, "The Eugenics WarS" that probably involved a combined force fighting in several of them tying them together into "WW III". Probably The European Union was on the side opposite the Supermen, and fought several in turn or simultaneously in different theaters of operation.

TNG's WW 4 or whatever the "post atomic horror" supposedly was just doesn't fit. I blame it all on Q lying.

I am no Encounter at Farpoint expert but I hated how First Contact retconned Earth history. In Star Trek, we were supposed to have gotten past all of the troubles, giving people hope. I do not understand to this day why TNG, of all shows, felt the need to change that.

100% agree, in the old (good) version, Humanity got itself together and met the Vulcans, in the new version, the Vulcans did it. So much for hope for the future.

 

[Damian]

100% agree, in the old (good) version, Humanity got itself together and met the Vulcans, in the new version, the Vulcans did it. So much for hope for the future.

I'm not sure it's so black and white. It's only been 10 years at that point since the end of World War III. "Encounter at Farpoint" and the Bell Riots episodes of DS9 indicated the mid 21st century was hell to live through.

But by the time of First Contact it's possible we had already hit rock bottom and were on our way out of the darkness. I mean, we know very little about Earth in 2063 in First Contact outside Montana. Was world peace taking hold by that point. Were we on our way to unifying ourselves? We don't know.

And I thought First Contact gave a very bright future. Troi said within 50 years all the ills that had plagues us for centuries would be solved. There would be no more hunger, poverty, wars on Earth and she said first contact unified humanity in ways no one imagined could ever happen (I'm paraphrasing). That's a pretty bright future if you ask me. We learn in Enterprise that the Vulcans weren't exactly forthcoming with their assistance so I have to imagine humanity managed much of that positive change on their own. That the knowledge that we truly were not alone was enough to cause that positive change basically.

I sometimes wonder what would happen to humanity if we really did discover that we were not alone in the universe. I mean, I believe their is life out there. So many planets have already been discovered--life had to evolve on some of those worlds. Would that have a positive affect on how we look and treat one another. Would we focus on what unites us instead of what divides us? I'd like to think so

 

[JonnyQuest037]

I think that totally depends on where we are as a planet and the circumstances by which our first contact with aliens happens. If it happened tomorrow, I'd hope the aliens would just decide to wait a few more years until we got our shit together as a planet.

 

[MAGolding]

SHORT VERSION:

I believe that the Eugenics Wars are both different from the Third World War in the TOS era list and identical with the Third World War in the TNG era list, since I believe that the two lists have two different wars listed as their Third World Wars.

LONG VERSION:

“But it is said: Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, for they are subtle and quick to anger. The choice is yours: to go or wait.'
'And it is also said,' answered Frodo: 'Go not to the Elves for counsel for they will answer both no and yes.'
'Is it indeed?' laughed Gildor. 'Elves seldom give unguarded advice, for advice is a dangerous gift, even from the wise to the wise, and all courses may run ill.”

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/756102-but-it-is-said-do-not-meddle-in-the-affairs

And like an elf I would have to answer both no and yes.

I believe that the list of Earth's world wars used in the era of THG was different from the list of Earth's world wars used in the era of TOS, I believe that at least one war was dropped from the list of world wars used in the era of TNG, presumably because it was considered to not fit the TNG criteria for qualifying as a world war.

In "Bread and Circuses" Spock mentions:

...the thirty seven million who died in your third.

http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/43.htm

And in Star trek: First Contact:

DATA: According to our astrometric readings we're in the mid twenty-first century. From the radioactive isotopes in the atmosphere I would estimate we have arrived approximately ten years after the Third World War.
RIKER: Makes sense. Most of the major cities have been destroyed. There are few governments left. Six hundred million dead. No resistance.

http://www.chakoteya.net/movies/movie8.html

Assuming that both casualty figures are exact, Riker's is about 16.2162 times Spock's figure. Therefore, it seems easy to deduce that Spock and Riker are not talking about the same Third World War, that different conflicts were named the Third World War in history texts written in different eras. Thus I believe that at least one conflict that was named a world war in the era of TOS was not named a world war in the ear of TNG.

Thus the Third World war in the TNG list would have been at least the Fourth World War in the TOS era list.

The Third World War in the TNG era list would seem to have been the last world war on Earth.

RIKER: It is one of the pivotal moments in human history, Doctor. You get to make first contact with an alien race, and after you do, everything begins to change.
LAFORGE: Your theories on warp drive allow fleets of starships to be built and mankind to start exploring the Galaxy.
TROI: It unites humanity in a way no one ever thought possible when they realise they're not alone in the universe. Poverty, disease, war. They'll all be gone within the next fifty years.
RIKER: But unless you make that warp flight tomorrow morning before eleven fifteen, none of it will happen.

http://www.chakoteya.net/movies/movie8.html

Was there another world war after the Third World War of Star Trek: First Contact?

In "UP the Long Ladder" Data says:

DATA: In the early twenty-second century, Earth was recovering from World War Three. A major philosopher of the period was Liam Dieghan, founder of the Neo-Transcendentalists, who advocated a return to a simpler life in which one lived in harmony with nature, and learned under her gentle tutelage

http://www.chakoteya.net/NextGen/144.htm

So if there were any wars big enough to be called world wars after the Third World War of Star Trek: First Contact, they apparently didn't add that much to the devastation that Earth was recovering from in the early 22nd century, so there probably weren't any world wars after the Third World War of Star Trek: First Contact.

Was there a big atomic war, a world war, after the Third World War of Star Trek: First Contact according to "Encounter at Farpoint"?

Q creates a trial similar to some in Earth's past:

DATA: Historically intriguing, Captain. Very, very accurate.
PICARD: Mid twenty first century. The post-atomic horror.

And:

DATA: If I may, Captain? Objection, your honour. In the year 2036, the new United Nations declared that no Earth citizen could be made to answer for the crimes of his race or forbears.
Q (JUDGE): Objection denied. This is a court of the year 2079, by which time more rapid progress had caused all United Earth nonsense to be abolished.

http://www.chakoteya.net/NextGen/101.htm

In Star trek IV:The Voyage Home Spock says:

SPOCK: If memory serves, there was a dubious flirtation with nuclear fission reactors resulting in toxic side effects. By the beginning of the fusion era, these reactors had been replaced, but at this time, we may be able to find some.

http://www.chakoteya.net/movies/movie4.html

Spock's words could be interpreted as meaning that nuclear fission was abandoned as a power source before nuclear fusion was available, which could have resulted in catastrophic energy shortages and the collapse of civilization in many countries, and thus a "Post (peaceful use of) Atomic (energy) Horror".

And if the "Post Atomic Horror" is supposed to be a "Post Atomic (War) Horror", 2079 would be only 16 years after 2063 and First Contact, the event that started the rebuilding of Earth, and only about 26 years after the Third World War of Star Trek: First Contact. If there was a real life big nuclear war, it is quite likely that human society would not fully recover in 260 years, or 2,600 years, or 26,000 years, or ever, so I see no need to speculate about an additional big nuclear war after the Third World War of Star Trek: First Contact.

I believe that the Third World War in Spock's list in "Bread and Circuses" happened before the Eugenics Wars, which would been at least the Fourth World war in the TOS era list.

Spock says that thirty seven million people were killed in the Third World War in the list Spock studied, while he said that "whole populations were being bombed out of existence" during the Eugenics Wars. Spock also said that Khan ruled over a quarter of the (population or land area?) of Earth from 1992-1996, and that in 1993 various supermen seized power in over forty more nations. So probably the whole populations being bombed out of existence in the Eugenics Wars included at least thirty seven million people, and possibly many more millions or even billions.

In "Bread and Circuses":

SPOCK: They do seem to have escaped the carnage of your first three world wars, Doctor.
MCCOY: They have slavery, gladiatorial games, despotism.
SPOCK: Situations quite familiar to the six million who died in your first world war, the eleven million who died in your second, the thirty seven million who died in your third. Shall I go on?

http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/43.htm

Spock says "Shall I go on?" because there are many, many, many other bloody wars in Earth history he could have mentioned. And possibly because there was at least one other world war on the TOS era list he could have mentioned. Unless Spock was so unscientific as to speculate that Earth would have more world wars sometime in the future, his mention of the first three world wars implies there had already been at least one other, a fourth, world war that happened after the third one and before the era of TOS.

In "Space Seed":

SPOCK: No such vessel listed. Records of that period are fragmentary, however. The mid=1990s was the era of your last so-called World War.

http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/24.htm

So Spock says that the Eugenics Wars was the last war on Earth big enough to be considered a world war. Thus the Eugenics wars have to be either the Third World War from "Bread and Circuses" or a later war. Spock's mention of the "first three world wars" in "Bread and Circuses" strongly indicates that Earth probably had at least one more world war. Therefore I deduce that the Eugenics Wars were at least the Fourth World War in the TOS era list, and the last world war in Earth history.

And I previously deduced that the war known as the Third World War in the era of TNG was know as at least the Fourth World War in the era of TOS, and the last world war in Earth history.

Therefore, it seems logical to deduce that the Eugenics Wars were different from the Third World War in the list used in the the era of TOS, and identical with the Third World War used in the era of TNG.

 

[Timo]

I am no Encounter at Farpoint expert but I hated how First Contact retconned Earth history. In Star Trek, we were supposed to have gotten past all of the troubles, giving people hope. I do not understand to this day why TNG, of all shows, felt the need to change that.

I'm not sure what changed, exactly. TOS told us that mankind was utter scum up until WWIII at the very least, barbaric not just by the standars of Spock and his tower of finest Vulcan ivory, but by the standards of our enlightened heroes, too. No specific date was given for the transformation from one sort of mankind to another. TNG then gave us the date. And nothing but the date, really - there was no added information about how mankind transformed itself. That only came in ST:FC, where we learned mankind didn't, and pointy-eared aliens from outer space are currently credited for the feat. Although the how is still very much missing.

Has mankind come to give credit differently in TNG? Or did it always give credit to Vulcans even in TOS? Well, we know the issue is muddled in ENT "still" or "already", which is fine with me. We can always choose to think mankind did it on its own, whether this includes cheering for Colonel Green or not. Or that mankind didn't. Mankind itself is allowed to be divided on the issue!

In contrast, mankind isn't divided on the issue of how many World Wars there were ("Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out."). But Vulcans are allowed to beg to differ, and Spock is allowed to differ twice.

I agree that World War III is kind of a blanket term for a period of war that affect most of the world like World War II is.

But the rock-solid end date for the Eugenics Wars is bluntly given as 1996 - no more tyrants after that date, save for those eighty in ice. Those wars thus cannot be equated with the much broader idea of WWIII, merely contained within it.

The wording of "Space Seed" suggests the Eugenics Wars are an "era" thing in themselves, allowing for the Botany Bay date of "mid-1990s" to be dropped within. Said date could equally well fit within the era of WWIII, but no dialogue speaks of that conflict as an era thing. Again we get a hard date for the end of WWIII, the 2053 figure our TNG heroes believe in, and again uncontested by other players. But this time we don't get any sort of a date for the supposed beginning, whereas 1993 is at least highly suggestive of a beginning date for Eugenics Wars.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Damian]

I'm not sure what changed, exactly. TOS told us that mankind was utter scum up until WWIII at the very least, barbaric not just by the standars of Spock and his tower of finest Vulcan ivory, but by the standards of our enlightened heroes, too. No specific date was given for the transformation from one sort of mankind to another. TNG then gave us the date. And nothing but the date, really - there was no added information about how mankind transformed itself. That only came in ST:FC, where we learned mankind didn't, and pointy-eared aliens from outer space are currently credited for the feat. Although the how is still very much missing.

Has mankind come to give credit differently in TNG? Or did it always give credit to Vulcans even in TOS? Well, we know the issue is muddled in ENT "still" or "already", which is fine with me. We can always choose to think mankind did it on its own, whether this includes cheering for Colonel Green or not. Or that mankind didn't. Mankind itself is allowed to be divided on the issue!

In contrast, mankind isn't divided on the issue of how many World Wars there were ("Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out."). But Vulcans are allowed to beg to differ, and Spock is allowed to differ twice.



But the rock-solid end date for the Eugenics Wars is bluntly given as 1996 - no more tyrants after that date, save for those eighty in ice. Those wars thus cannot be equated with the much broader idea of WWIII, merely contained within it.

The wording of "Space Seed" suggests the Eugenics Wars are an "era" thing in themselves, allowing for the Botany Bay date of "mid-1990s" to be dropped within. Said date could equally well fit within the era of WWIII, but no dialogue speaks of that conflict as an era thing. Again we get a hard date for the end of WWIII, the 2053 figure our TNG heroes believe in, and again uncontested by other players. But this time we don't get any sort of a date for the supposed beginning, whereas 1993 is at least highly suggestive of a beginning date for Eugenics Wars.

Timo Saloniemi

Yeah, I think what cinches the deal here is there are two defined dates given, 1996 was the end of the Eugenics Wars and 2053 was the end of WWIII. Now you can argue the original intent during the original series, at least in "Space Seed" were that they were one and the same, and maybe Spock was referring to the same thing in "Bread and Circuses", though there he clearly said in your 'third world war' and said nothing about eugenics there.

And that's where the retcon comes into play. Now we can argue how big a retcon it is, I don't feel it's a huge retcon because they don't really touch the Eugenics Wars, they just separated out WWIII as a separate conflict which conflicts only with a single line of dialogue in "Space Seed" (and does not actually conflict with "Breads and Circuses" at least literally). But references are later made to the Eugenics Wars in the Star Trek universe as a separate conflict from WWIII.

So simply put, I believe at the time of the original series the idea was that they were the same thing, but from TNG on they became separate conflicts in universe.

And yeah, who was responsible for the turnaround in humanity? Well we know it does happen, but the how is left to the imagination. It seems, based on Enterprise, the Vulcans would take a minimalist approach--we know for instance they don't like to interfere. So I always felt that the knowledge that man was not in fact alone in the universe in and of itself caused a change in how mankind viewed itself (Troi does hint at that, that the knowledge we are not alone affected change). Probably hitting rock bottom in WWIII made mankind realize also that they had to turn things around. Likely it was a combination of factors, including a 'little help from our friends', the Vulcans, however minimal it may have been.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Spock says "Shall I go on?" because there are many, many, many other bloody wars in Earth history he could have mentioned. And possibly because there was at least one other world war on the TOS era list he could have mentioned. Unless Spock was so unscientific as to speculate that Earth would have more world wars sometime in the future, his mention of the first three world wars implies there had already been at least one other, a fourth, world war that happened after the third one and before the era of TOS.

Yeah, that "Shall I go on?" at the end of Spock's speech is certainly intriguing. What would he have gone on to, I wonder?

 

[Neopeius]

And in looking up info for this post, I learned that there was a deleted scene from "The Corbomite Maneuver" where it was implied that World War III was actually avoided after Earth came very close to it at the time of the "Sino-Western trouble."

By Gary 7, of course.

Eugenics Wars and WW3 are the same.

That said, I don't bother with post-1978 canon anyway. And since I live in 1964, there's no canon at all! Except that Gene currently is working on producing the first pilot for Trek...