The Enterprise is on a diplomatic mission to Eminiar VII, the principal planet in a star cluster that has resisted attempts to open up contact. When the planet's leaders request the Enterprise to stay away at all costs, Kirk's inclination is to honor that request... but his guest, Ambassador Fox (Gene Lyons) insists on ignoring the request and continuing to the planet.
Once they arrive, the planet's High Council extends every courtesy. The head of the council, Anan 7 (David Opatoshu), politely rejects diplomatic overtures, explaining that their world is in the midst of a generations-long war with a neighboring planet. While Kirk's team is meeting with Anan, an attack occurs. Anan declares massive casualties, even though no damage appears to have been done to the planet's surface. That is when Spock reaches the only logical conclusion, which Anan confirms: the war is being fought in purely theoretical terms, by computers, with calculated casualties then ordered to report to disintegration chambers. In this way, Anan explains, the war can go on without the cultures of the two planets being destroyed along with the people.
Then Anan drops a particularly big bombshell on Kirk. In the last attack, the computer declared the Enterprise destroyed. Kirk and his team are made hostages, with Anan declaring that the entire Enterprise crew must beam down for disintegration!
CHARACTERS
Capt. Kirk: He is outraged by the antiseptic "war" Anan is waging, and even more outraged that the people of this world simply meekly walk into disintegration chambers. To Kirk, going to one's death without a fight - without at least attempting to live - is incomprehensible. In a moment of inspired ruthlessness, Kirk actually threatens destruction on the surface of the planet, ordering Scotty to fire on this world if the Away Team is not released. Anan believes it's a bluff - and in later seasons (or with any later captain, except possibly Sisko) it certainly would be. But here, it is never made clear if Kirk is bluffing. Scotty certainly seems appalled at the order, and there is never a quick exchange between Kirk and Spock or Kirk and Scott to indicate that "General Order 24" is anything other than what it seems. To viewers of the time, to whom the Prime Directive had yet to become a staple of the series, it may well have seemed plausible that Kirk's threat was genuine.
That Vulcan Voodoo You Do: Spock's telepathic abilities now do not require physical contact, or even visual contact, with a subject. He can plant suggestions in the minds of their captors from inside a locked room. Spock can appreciate the logic behind the planet's peculiar method of warfare, but supports his captain in his efforts to stop it. He also displays a very straight-faced sense of humor here, as when he orders a yeoman to prevent the female guest star of the week "from immolating herself. Knock here down and sit on her if you have to," or when he tells Ambassador Fox that the time has come to practice "a peculiar variety of diplomacy," while destroying a disintegration chamber.
Scotty: Refuses to be bullied by the irritating Ambassador Fox into dropping the ship's shields, and agrees to Kirk's radical "general order" with only the slightest of hesitations. His loyalty to his captain and ship is unswerving, and he does not seem particularly impressed by the authority of an ambassador he clearly views as an outsider.
Hot Alien Space Babe of the Week: Barbara Babcock is Mea 3, who provides Kirk with a very attractive reception upon the Away Team's arrival. Mea is declared a casualty of the attack, and considers it her duty to report for disintegration. Kirk will not allow that, and rescues her against her will. Unusually for a Trek episode, she does not become a romantic interest for Kirk... probably because with the amount going on in the episode already, there would simply have been no time for it.
Pompous Starfleet Bureaucrat of the Week: Gene Lyons' Ambassador Fox is not a million miles removed from the irritating Starfleet official in The Galileo Seven. He is quite arrogant, and so completely certain of himself that he cannot seem to imagine the possibility that he could be wrong in anything. He does end up coming across a bit better than the one in Galileo, if only because when the situation becomes clear, he willingly participates in Spock's rescue of Kirk. He also volunteers to stay on Eminiar to negotiate a true peace between the warring planets, making him a pompous pain in the neck, but ultimately a sincere man.
Villain of the Week: Sincerity is the order of the day, as David Opatoshu's Anan 7 gives us the most interesting and implacable of foes: a villain who genuinely believes that what he is doing is right. Anan makes a reasonably persuasive argument for why this method of warfare is necessary. The individuals die, but the culture, its architecture, its infrastructure and accomplishments all survive. Anan values the continuity of the culture above its population, and is ruthless in doing whatever he has to do to ensure that continuity. The prospect of a real war terrifies him - something Kirk capitalizes on at the episode's end.
THOUGHTS
Though not quite up there with, say, Balance of Terror, A Taste of Armageddon is a fine episode. On the one hand, it succeeds as an action story, cranking its plot along at a cracking pace. Kirk, Spock, and the Away Team effectively fight their own war against Anan and his disintegration chambers even as Anan fights his antiseptic war against Vendakar. At the same time, Anan fights a losing war against the Enterprise, using deception to attempt to lure the ship to lowering its defenses.
The "armageddon" of the title pervades the episode's content. A generations-long war between the two planets has resulted in the loss of millions (possibly billions) of lives over time. The casualty count is staggering, and itself seems like a vision of hell, with generations raised to believe it is their duty to walk like sheep to the slaughter. The reason for this? A fear of the armageddon that would result from a real, physically-destructive war. The savage irony, which Kirk can see but which the people who have been raised to believe in this system cannot, is that this "clean war" allows the two worlds to fight on and on, without end, when a real war would have ended long ago, with ultimately far fewer dead. Anan 7 wants armageddon for the Enterprise, prompting Kirk in his turn to threaten to unleash a genuine armageddon against Anan's world. For an episode with a comparatively low casualty count (only a few extras are disintegrated on camera, and no speaking characters), it is one of the most destructive of the entire series.
An intriguing science fiction vision of war, a fast pace, and a set of characters who ultimately are all sincere in believing that they are right in what they do. And Kirk gets to make one of his best speeches at the end. "We are not going to kill... Today!" What more could any Trek fan possibly ask?
Rating: 9/10.
Previous Episode: Return of the Archons
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