Eugenics Wars

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"Superior ability breeds superior ambition."

- Augment scientist (TOS: "Space Seed")

The Eugenics Wars (or Great Wars) were a series of conflicts fought on Earth in the mid-1990s. The result of a scientific attempt to improve the human race through selective breeding and genetic engineering, the wars devastated parts of Earth, causing some 30 million deaths and nearly plunging the planet into a new Dark Age. (TOS: "Space Seed"; ENT: "Borderland")

Prelude

Records from this period are fragmentary, but what is known is that the wars' roots lie in a group of human scientists' ambitious attempt to improve the race through selective breeding and genetic engineering. They created a race of "supermen" popularly known as the Augments, who were mentally and physically superior to ordinary men and women. They were five times stronger than the average person, their lung efficiency was 50 percent better than normal, and their intelligence was double that of normal humans. They also had enhanced senses, including the ability to hear beyond that of human capabilities. (TOS: "Space Seed"; ENT: "Borderland", "Cold Station 12")

However, one aspect these scientists overlooked was the personality of the Augments. Along with their superior abilities, the Augments were aggressive and arrogant, "flaws" which the scientists were unable to correct at the time due to the infant stage of the science. One of the Augments' creators realized this, writing that "superior ability breeds superior ambition". That same scientist was ultimately killed by one of his own creations. (TOS: "Space Seed"; ENT: "Cold Station 12", "The Augments")

Rise to power

File:Khan2266.jpg

Khan Noonien Singh

The Augments rose to power and held dominance over a large portion of humanity beginning in the early 1990s. Among the most notorious of these superhuman conquerors was Khan Noonien Singh, who in 1992 became the "absolute ruler" of more than a quarter of the planet, from Asia through the Middle East. The following year, a group of fellow "supermen" followed in Khan's footsteps and simultaneously seized power in over 40 nations. Some people were treated as little more than slaves by the Augments. Unlike some other nations ruled by Augments, however, under Khan's rule there were no massacres and no wars of aggression until he was attacked; he was thus among the most admired of the so-called tyrants into the 23rd century, being called the "best of the tyrants" by Capt. James T. Kirk. (TOS: "Space Seed"; ENT: "Borderland")

Conflicts

Reports as to exactly how the wars began vary; some claim that humanity rose up against Khan and his fellow "supermen", while others believe the Augments began to fight among themselves. Regardless of how they began or who started them, the Eugenics Wars had a devastating impact on Earth as entire populations were bombed out of existence. (ENT: "Cold Station 12"; TOS: "Space Seed") As the wars raged and many areas were devastated, others (including those of the United States of America) remained largely unaffected. (VOY: "Future's End")

Among the areas affected by the wars was North Africa. One conflict that occurred there involved a battalion of soldiers that included the great-grandfather of future Starfleet Captain Jonathan Archer. In this encounter, Archer's great-grandfather was able to convince the commander of his enemy's forces to hold their fire long enough to evacuate a school that was directly between them. (ENT: "Hatchery")

The Augments were eventually defeated by humans not genetically enhanced, with Khan being the last of the tyrants to be overthrown in 1996. However, over eighty of the "supermen" (including Khan) went unaccounted for, a fact the governments of the time did not disclose to the public in order to prevent panic. In 2267, it was discovered that Khan and 83 of his followers had managed to flee the planet unattended aboard the early sleeper ship SS Botany Bay. (TOS: "Space Seed", Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan)

The official number of casualties from the wars was placed at 30 million, although some historians believe it to be closer to 35 million. Although the wars may have ended, humanity's fear of genetically-engineered beings remained well into the 24th Century. (ENT: "Cold Station 12"; DS9: "Doctor Bashir, I Presume")

Aftermath

Following the wars, controversial debates ensued between Earth's governments regarding the fate of thousands of Augment embryos. Unsure how to handle the issue, the governments opted to have the embryos placed into cryogenic suspension. This fact, however, was also kept from public knowledge. (ENT: "The Augments")

The issue of genetic manipulation and human genome enhancement continued to plague Earth into the 21st century, proving to be one of the causes of further conflicts that ultimately erupted into World War III in 2026. (ENT: "In a Mirror, Darkly, Part II": Image:Historical archive, Starfleet.jpg) In the 23rd century, the Eugenics Wars themselves would sometimes be viewed as synonymous with the Third World War, and possibly regarded as the initial cause of the war. (TOS: "Space Seed"; ENT: "In a Mirror, Darkly, Part II")

Genetic engineering of humans was ultimately banned on Earth as the concept was considered anti-humanistic by Earth leaders. As a result of this, Doctor Stavos Keniclius was exiled from his community, which eventually led him to leave Earth. The ban was placed primarily as an attempt to prevent another event like the Eugenics Wars and to ensure that humanity did not endure the wrath of another Khan Noonien Singh. (TAS: "The Infinite Vulcan"; DS9: "Doctor Bashir, I Presume", "Statistical Probabilities")

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Soong and the Augment embryos.

However, the ban on genetic engineering would be challenged by the geneticist Arik Soong in the 2130s, when he stole some of the Augment embryos leftover from the wars, which were being stored at Cold Station 12. Soong believed that genetic engineering was the key to improving humankind and preventing illness and that it should be given another chance. By raising the Augments himself, Soong believed he could prevent them from behaving like their brethren from the Eugenics Wars. His plan failed, however, as the aggressive nature of the Augments took dominance and they threatened to incite war and cause mass murder. Earth Starfleet's mission to hunt down and capture the renegade "supermen" ultimately led to the destruction of the Augments and most of the embryos. (ENT: "Borderland", "Cold Station 12", "The Augments")

Not all of the embryos were destroyed. Some found their way into the hands of Klingons who, believing Humans were improving themselves in order to conquer the Klingon Empire, attempted to use the DNA from the embryos to enhance themselves. The end result, however, was a mutation of a highly contagious virus that caused massive changes in physical appearance, biological structure, and even basic personality traits of large portions of the Klingon race. (ENT: "Affliction", "Divergence")

See also:

• Augment Crisis
• Klingon augment virus

Background Information

TOS: "Space Seed" and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan gave the date for the Wars as the 1990s, but DS9: "Doctor Bashir, I Presume" was thought by some to have retconned that date with a reference to them having occurred two centuries prior to the events of that episode. This would have placed the Wars in the mid-to-late 22nd century, which was inconsistent with Star Trek: First Contact. Episode writer Ronald D. Moore later admitted [1] to having referred to the line from Star Trek II The Wrath of Khan but accidentally forgot to account for the show being a century later. The original date of the Wars was reaffirmed when Phlox stated in ENT: "Borderland", that Arik Soong's Augments were pretty sophisticated for 20th century genetics. Phlox later mentions to the Klingons that genetic engineering on Earth was "banned decades ago", likely meaning not more than a century ago. Which could mean that it wasn't until a long time after the Eugenics Wars that genetic engineering was banned, likely following the formation of United Earth.

Also, in "Space Seed" Spock describes the Eugenics Wars as "the era of your last so-called world war", suggesting this conflict could be World War III. However, the same phrase could also mean that some contemporaries of the Eugenics Wars optimistically thought it would be the last global conflict (i.e., that it was so-called the "last" world war at the time, when in fact it wasn't - rather like WWI being "The War to End All Wars"). In TOS: "Bread and Circuses", it is stated by Spock that 37 million died in World War III-- consistent with Phlox's assertion that over 30 million died in the Eugenics Wars (again connecting WWIII and the Eugenics Wars), but not Riker's claim that 600 million died in the nuclear conflict in the 2050s. However, as Spock was speaking in the context of despotism, and his numbers for WWI and WWII are not consistent with known total death counts, the connection is less than conclusive.

Although TNG has never stated when WWIII occurred until the movies, the problem is further complicated with the TNG Episode "Up The Long Ladder". Data says that in the early 22nd century they were still recovering from World War III. However, given Riker's established end date of WWIII as mid-21st Century, and the continuation, even post-First Contact of the post-atomic horror until at least 2079, it is not impossible to imagine that recovery from that massively devastating conflict might still be occuring in the early 2100's. Even TOS talks about wars in the early 21st century ("The Savage Curtain"). It is also possible, given speculation that the Eastern Coalition was comprised of many of the nations Khan was thought to have conquered that the two conflicts may be linked through causal history in much the same way as World War I and World War II. So it is unclear if there is something we do not understand, and perhaps some historians by the 23rd century connect the two wars - much as some 21st Century historians today connect WWI and WWII into one long conflict.

Some fans have speculated that, since real life history does not support the existence of the Eugenics Wars, the Star Trek universe may actually take place in parallel reality, in which case, conflicts with factual events would be moot. It has also been speculated that the Eugenics Wars were fought and won in secret, which could explain instances in Star Trek canon that do not directly support their existence during the 1990s. This is how they were portrayed in the novels by Greg Cox.

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