MACO
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The MACOs (Military Assault Command Operations) are an elite Terran military command in the Star Trek: Enterprise fiction universe.
Although MACOs may be assigned to serve with Starfleet, they are not part of the Starfleet chain of command, and as such do not wear Starfleet uniforms. They normally wear grey camouflage and, when in combat, have power packs on their backs. Along with particle weapons (their primary weapons are called plasma rifles), they are also expert at hand-to-hand combat.
Their Enterprise mission patch has a shark on it. (In the mirror universe, a skull appears on the patch. Malcolm Reed and Travis Mayweather are MACOS in the mirror universe.) Their motto is "Ever Invincible." They train at the military academy at West Point. The leader of the MACO corps is General Casey, who assured Captain Jonathan Archer that the MACOS assigned to Enterprise were the finest warriors in the corps.
They were assigned to the Enterprise before setting out from earth into the Delphic Expanse (at the end of Season 2). Their job was to accompany the Enterprise and assist in the more militaristic functions of the ship. Ostensibly, this would seem akin to the Marines of navies in the past, who would accompany fleet vessels for the same purposes. In the first episode of Season 3, "The Xindi," the MACOs participated in a mission on a mining planet to rescue Captain Archer and Commander Tucker. The rescue mission demonstrated their skills in rappelling, marksmanship, close quarters battle and small unit tactics. They use their particle weapons in submachine gun style, firing rapidly in bursts. They also have stun grenades and a hooked baton similar to a nightstick, which they use to take down foes at close range. The plasma rifle which some soldiers seem to use features a pop-up thermal or image-enhancing scope which they use to snipe targets (it is not known for certain whether these weapons can be set to stun, or if they are kill-only).
Besides Major Hayes, there are a few recurring MACO characters. One is a Corporal Chang played by Daniel Dae Kim, a Sergeant Kemper played by Nathan Anderson and a Corporal Hawkins played by Sean McGowan. There are also at least two other recurring MACO characters who are unnamed, a European-American woman and an African-American man. A female MACO, S. Money, is played by Dorenda Moore. A MACO named Corporal Amanda Cole, played by Noa Tishby, was introduced as a possible love interest of Commander Tucker, but has not been seen since the episode she was introduced. Paul Sklar (who also does stunts for Scott Bakula) has appeared as R. Richards, while Julia Rose made a well-publicized single appearance as Corporal McKenzie in the episode "Anomaly" (early publicity suggested she would be come a recurring character, but this did not happen).
The MACOs' actions closely resemble that of current military special forces or police SWAT teams, which have become increasingly popular. Their weapon seems very similar to an MP5 submachine gun in function and size, including the three round burst mode. The stun grenades are also very similar to "flashbang" grenades. The rifle in sniper mode also bears a strong resemblance to the Federation sniper rifle from the Star Trek: Voyager Elite Force video games, which preceded Enterprise. Like special forces and SWAT units, they tend to operate in groups, move in tactical "snake" formation and use hand signals and gesturing, rather than verbal communication. They are frequently depicted in episodes as laying suppressing fire while one of the main characters, for example Captain Archer, runs for a certain objective.
Following the conclusion of the Xindi mission, Captain Archer chose to retain a contingent of MACOs on board Enterprise; several MACOs appear in the fourth season episode, "Borderland." A MACO guard (in a normal duty uniform, not the armor/fatigues we usually see MACOs wear) is briefly seen in "The Forge", conducting security screenings of visitors to Earth's embassy on Vulcan; this MACO is subsequently killed in an explosion at the embassy.
Some fans criticized the appearance of the MACOs as an attempt to increase the amount of action in Enterprise in an effort to boost flagging ratings, while others see them as a forerunner of the heavily armed Starfleet security personnel seen in Star Trek: The Original Series and Star Trek: The Motion Picture, and Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. Notably, the enlisted rank structure of the MACOs is similar to that of the United States Marine Corps and the United States Army.
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Flag Officer ranks
Officer ranks
Enlisted grades
External link
- IMDB entry for Enterprise guest credits (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0244365/guests)