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From: arnold@gatech.UUCP (Arnold Robbins)
Newsgroups: net.startrek
Subject: Re: A Command Question (command precedence)
Message-ID: <6708@gatech.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 1-May-84 14:21:40 EDT
Article-I.D.: gatech.6708
Posted: Tue May  1 14:21:40 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 3-May-84 07:15:17 EDT
References: <444@ihlts.UUCP>
Organization: Georgia Tech School of ICS, Atlanta
Lines: 24

Actually, Dr. McCoy was also an officer, a Lt. Cmdr, equivalent to Scotty,
but he never took command.  Taking command also apparently requires some
training (going to Starfleet Acadamy).  A doctor would not have had any
of the necessary training (military tactics, etc).  Scotty, who (from some
of the books) apparently rose from the ranks, may not have gone to the
Academy, but he undoubtedly has lots of experience from having served in
the fleet X number of years.

In one of the new ST books (The Entropy Effect) Spock goes time-travelling,
and leaves McCoy in charge, w/out telling Scott, in order to keep secret
that he's trying to change the past.  So (for a little while, History does
get changed, and so it ends up not happening) McCoy did get to command.

As has been mentioned, in one of the animated episodes, Uhura does take
command, since ALL the men are off the ship, including Sulu.

-- 
Arnold Robbins
CSNET: arnold@gatech
ARPA:  arnold%gatech.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa
UUCP:  ...!{akgua, allegra, rlgvax, sb1, ut-sally}!gatech!arnold

"All this digital stuff is just a fad.  Analog is the way to go."
	-- William M. Robbins, 1984