In Star Trek, can a member of an actively hostile species join Star Fleet?

time to pull out the geek card…

In the later episodes of DS9, Nog, a Ferengi applied to be in the Academy. Nog and Sisko informed us that in order for a member of a non-Federation species to be considered, they have to be recommended by a command-level officer.

While we’ve never seen any attempts by any Federation enemies to join Starfleet, I’m willing to bet the same sort of thing would apply. That there is some sort of “not unless <X>” rule. Put more generally, it’s a generic rule of life that you can do anything the rules tell you you can’t, so long as you have the right signatures.

I’d say that the Ferengii and Bejorans were likely more neutral than hostile. The Klingons had entered into a peace treaty with and then actually joined the Federation.

The Romulans and Cardassians, on the other hand, maintain an active war footing against the Federation.

@robmandu: That’s why I’m curious. The Bajorans and Klingons are allies of the Federation and the Ferengii, while not allies of the Federation, have friendly relations. What if a Cardassian or Romulan wanted to defect to the Federationa and become a Star Fleet officer.

Yah, I guess @MrItty nailed it then explaining that a command-level officer would need to provide the recommendation.

Even after that, I’m sure there’d be a lot more qualification and review to pass. It would just get the ball rolling.

I’ll bet if you asked this guy, he could probably give you the correct answer to this question.

@robmandu The Klingons never joined the Federation. They were allies for most of the TNG era (except for that brief period during DS9 when they rescinded the Kitomer Accords and went to war against the Federation)

If they graduated from Starfleet Acadamy, then yeah!