Red and White
Note: This was a cooperative effort between Andy Squires and myself. I wrote this, except for a few phrases near the beginning, and the only advice I received from Andy was related to the plot. We came up with this idea as a response to an assignment from our AP World History teacher. It is a script for a proposed Star Trek episode based around early Communist Russia. I shall have it be known that I do not own any rights to Star Trek
Kirk- Captain's Log: Stardate 5468.2. We are returning to Starbase 3762 for a warp drive overhaul. Our engines were severely damaged after our latest run in with the Klingons. End recording. Uhura, patch me through to Engineering.
Scottie- Engineering, Scott here.
Kirk- Scottie, engine status.
Scottie- She canna take much more o' this, Captain. Those Klingons did a real number on our engines. I dunna think we're gonna have enough power ta get ta the Starbase.
Kirk- We need all the power we can get Scottie. We must get this shipment of grain to the colonists of Xanathalia Prime. They need our help.
Scottie- Aye, Captain. We're doin' our best down here. Scott out.
Kirk-Space, the final frontier.
These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise.
Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before.
Theme Plays…Chekov- (walks onto bridge, dazed and oblivious)
Spock- Mr. Chekov, you are illogically early. Your duty shift does not begin until 0800. It is only 0430.
Chekov- (sits down and begins pushing buttons)
Spock- Mr. Chekov, what are you doing?
Chekov- (pushes buttons)
Spock- Mr. Chekov, you will respond now or I will call Security.
Chekov- (pushes buttons)
Spock- Captain Kirk, please report to the Bridge. (tries to stop button pushing, gets thrown away)
Kirk- (comes in) Mr. Spock, what's going on?
Spock- Mr. Chekov is inputting course corrections. Now heading 208 mark 4.
Kirk- What's out there?
Chekov/Lenin- The planet, Proletaria.
Kirk- Mr. Chekov? Why?
Chekov/Lenin- I am not Chekov.
Kirk- Who are you? And what have you done with my navigator?
Chekov/Lenin- I am the spirit of Vladimir Lenin. I have merely possessed this crewman's body.
Kirk- Why Chekov?
Chekov/Lenin- Because he is the only proud Russian on board. Besides, I required his services to redirect the course of this ship.
Kirk- But why?
Chekov/Lenin- The people of the dictatorship of Proletaria are starving. They need the grain in your ship's stores. The workers are preparing to strike, and street demonstrations have already begun. Captain Kirk, you are their only hope.
Spock- Captain, if memory serves, this situation is nearly identical to that of Russia in the early twentieth century. After their withdrawal from World War I in 1917, the Russian state fell apart due to food shortages, a weakened army, and several mutinies, mainly centered in Petrograd, or St. Petersburg. Following a series of demonstrations and strikes, the starving serfs, who had been oppressed by the Romanov Tsars, revolted, killing Tsar Nicholas II and overthrowing the Romanov dynasty, which had ruled over Russia for precisely 304 years. Socialist councils known as soviets took control for a brief period.
Chekov/Lenin- Quite right, my Wulcan friend. Then I came around. I had been exiled to Switzerland, where I studied the writings of Marx and Engels, agreeing with most of their philosophies. But, unlike them, I did not believe that the average industrial worker was capable of starting a successful revolution without outside help. That was where my Bolsheviks and I came in. The Germans shipped me into Russia, hoping that I would get my country to back out from the war. We worked to gain support from the workers and proletariats, by preaching for "Peace, Land, and Bread", exactly what the starving and oppressed people were looking for. On November 6, 1917, my Bolshevik party and I took control of all Russia by invading the Winter Palace where the All-Russian National Congress of Soviets was being held. I declared Russia a dictatorship of the proletariat, a dictatorship for the working class. We then withdrew from the Great War with the signing of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, giving up quite a lot of territory to the Germans but allowing our new government the opportunity to deal with the social problems left by the blasted Romanovs. Several years passed until in 1922, I declared Russia the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics or the Soviet Union, Earth's first socialist society.
Kirk- If I remember my history correctly, you came up with several economic solutions to solve the problem that the people of Proletaria are having now. How did those work out?
Chekov/Lenin- Terribly. All of my plans, like war communism, when I got rid of private property and ended up seizing crops from the peasants to feed everyone, failed rather badly, with people starving left and right.
Kirk- I must have slept through that part of my class on Earth History at Starfleet Academy.
Chekov/Lenin- The one almost-success that I had was with my NEP, New Economic Policy. With that, I tried to undo what I had messed up with war communism. I restored the market economy, let the peasants sell surpluses in a free market, and began training people to help modernize Russia. But then I died and Stalin took over with his five-year plans.
Spock- Captain, Proletaria directly ahead.
Kirk- Enter a standard orbit, Mr. Spock.
Uhura- Captain, picking up transmissions from the planet. It's old-style radio, sir.
Kirk- What is it?
Uhura- It sounds like… I don't know, sir. Everyone's talking colors. Red and White.
Chekov/Lenin- Oh, dear…
Kirk- What is it?
Spock- I believe that he is referring to the civil war that is going on on the planet's surface, as well as the one that occurred on ancient Earth. The Reds, or members of the Communist or Bolshevik Party, began to systematically annihilate Whites, or those opposed to communism. Over 10 million died, more often of disease and starvation than from the actual fighting.
Chekov/Lenin- This society is progressing at a much faster rate than my Russia. Next thing you know, we'll hear Stalin's foul mispronunciation of the mother tongue come belting out over the tundra.
Uhura- Captain, picking up another transmission now.
Kirk- On speakers.
Stalin- Some may say that the good things we have here should be spread to the other nations of the world. I disagree; we shall keep the fruits of our socialist ideals within our own Soviet Union. With this, my Five-Year Plan, we will bring our country up into the ranks of what were once the world's most powerful industrialized societies. Now, their governments and their economies are perched precariously on the edge of a deadly downward slope. We are 50 to 100 years behind the advanced countries. Either we do it, or we shall go under.
Kirk- Turn it off. Explanation.
Spock- Shortly following Lenin's death, members of the Politburo, the Communist Party's leading government body, disagreed both as to who should lead the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and as to how the rest of the world should be exposed to socialist values. Joseph Stalin, who eventually took power as dictator in 1928, believed that socialism should be kept to the Soviets and no one else should be allowed to establish it.
Chekov/Lenin- Stalin's first Five-Year Plan was intended to replace my NEP. Its goal was to transform the Soviet Union into an industrial power that could lead the rest of the civilized world. He tried to centralize the economy and collectivize the farms, so that there would be food for the industrial workers that he required to modernize the country. This only led to protests from the farmers who killed their pigs and cattle and burned crops before leaving their land and heading into the cities. Those who stayed starved because they could not meet their quotas. Stalin went on to claim that it was a success, something that came into controversy at the next congress of the Communist party in 1934.
Kirk- And at the Congress of Victors, later known as the Congress of Victims, Stalin felt that his authority was being undermined and he started another civil war that put 8 million in labor camps and killed 3 million. So I take it that that is what'll probably be happening down there in a little while. ( looks at the others because they look at him funny) I didn't sleep through everything, you know!
Chekov/Lenin- Yes, yes, Captain. You must do something to stop it. Help them. Please.
Spock- Captain, need I remind you of Starfleet's Non-Interference Directive.
Kirk- Not at all, Mr. Spock. Mr. Chekov, I mean Lenin. Starfleet's Prime Directive prohibits me from helping in situations like these.
Chekov/Lenin- But you're just going to let all of those people die?
Kirk- Mr. Lenin, you seem highly capable of taking control of people's bodies. Why don't you just go down there, possess the Proletarian Stalin, and fix it yourself?
Chekov/Lenin- (momentarily silent) I hadn't thought of that, thank you, Captain.
Chekov- (shakes head as if clearing it) Hey… He's gone!
Kirk- Kirk to Engineering.
Scottie- Engineering, Scott here.
Kirk- Scottie, do we have enough power to get to the Starbase?
Scottie- No, sir. Not unless you can find us some antimatter and new dilithium crystals, sir. I may be good, but I'm not that good.
Spock- Captain, if the Proletariats continue at this rate of development, they should have nuclear capabilities in approximately 36.9 days.
Kirk- Scottie?
Scottie- I dunna know, sir. I might be able to rig 'er up to run on nuclear power.
Kirk- Give it your best, Scottie. Kirk out… So, Mr. Chekov, what was it like to have the consciousness of an ancient Russian leader in your head?
Chekov- It made me feel wery proud to be Russian, sir. But I do have the oddest craving for a hot bowl of borscht and a shot or two of vodka.
Kirk- (laughs) Mr. Spock, what time is it?
Spock- It is 0500.
Kirk- Really? Well then, I'm going back to bed, or I'll have Doc Bones after me again to go lie down. You too, Mr. Chekov. I get the feeling this is going to be a long day.
I hope you enjoyed this random bit of fun. AND I hope you learned something! I would really love it if you would review! Thanks for reading!