Who should lead SG1?(Spoilers)

[sindicate]

Ah, my apologies to everyone then. I may be slightly oversensitive and I obviously misread both the posts and the tone of posts.
Let's let it die there shall we?


There is no doubt pressing the button was stupid. But then, so was Daniel's, reading it or not reading it.
I really don't think that that one little thing should disqualify Mitchell from command.
Jack screwed up a great deal more than that (Reece anyone??)

hmm wasn't it Daniel and Vala who alerted the Ori to our presence lol

I might be wrong

Militarily speaking, does the fact that Mitchell missed Carter's briefing, for a mission we'd been told Carter was leading, mean she wasn't his direct commander for that mission?

No he should know that she is in command and should follow her, but his best friend also just died and like he says "I'm in a bad mood today" not much of a defence in a court martial though, but might explain why he was acting so recklessly

[ShardsofGlass]

I don't know. Mitchell seemed awfully darn competent in The Scourge, and he seemed to be in charge during the whole ep to me.

Personally, I think people are too hung up on fairness. The real world doesn't work that way. New people are brought into new positions from somewhere else all the time. It happens in the military and it happens in business.

Also, Carter herself doesn't seem very interested in leading SG-1 right now. She congratulated Mitchell on getting command. To me, she seems content to be in charge of all the science, which is her forte anyway.

I know, I know, the writers made her do it. But you can either talk about what's on the screen, which we can all see. Or you can speculate till you're (by "you" I mean everyone) blue in the face about what the writers and producers had in mind when they brought in Mitchell. I think they're two separate conversations.

Would Carter make a good leader? Sure. Does Mitchell make a good leader? Except for a couple of wobbles, absolutely. <shrug> Personally, I like Carter doing the science stuff more than I like her being a leader.

[Lightsabre]

Carter DID command SG-1, she earned her position as CO in s8 or she wouldn't have gotten it. I don't think we can debate the fact that she could be a CO, she was.

good, cause I'm not. I never said that she wasn't the CO in S8. The person I was replying to was talking about the 2IC position, that is waht I responded to.

The debate is about (partially) whether she has more leadership experience than Mitchell. She doesn't (probably). But her experience is more valuable. She has a year of experience as the CO of the flag-ship field team and did a kick *** job.

Experience doesn't mean you have to lead. Carter, as 2IC, is still providing and using her valuable experience, without having the leader tag.
I fail to see the problem

Mitchell has [insert number] of years of experience as the leader of a group of fighter pilots. He had no off world experience when he got the job (and he's not learning real fast), and no ground experience that we've been told of (feel free to exclude the latter if you believe TPTB are still sane).

I believe TPTB are still sane. There has been a lot done 'behind the scenes' this season that shouldn't have, in my opinion. We should know more about Mitchell's commands, if you ask me.

The difference between making calls from a cockpit and doing so on the ground is HUGE, its a different way of thinking and operating. He needs time to adjust. He needs someone to learn from. He thought he needed to learn from Sam, and there's no reason for that to have changed.

I disagree here. Presumably, Mitchell has previous ground experience and underwent training prior to joining SG-1. The alternitive suggests the show has devolved into lunacy.
I will remind you that all the previous commanders of SG-1 have been pilots.

[
Mitchell has no experience that we've heard of or could fairly deduce that puts him above Carter in leading the flag-ship ground team in the middle of a war. Sam is not incompetent, she did the same thing for a year (just a different war). And Mitchell does not yet have the experience to beat that.

Uhh, fairly deduce? We could fairly deduce that Mitchell has had at least 2 commands, possibly more.
He has been assesed as having above average leadership skills and so therefore must have demonstrated them.
The air force is not going to put an above average squadron leader in charge of a ground team. Evne the military isn't THAT dumb.

Lightsabre, please read my pervious post in regards to Daniel's button pushing. Daniel shouldn't have needed to tell mitchell to keep his hands to himself.

I've read them, I disagree.
Please read my comments to see why. I think we'll have to agree to disagree on the action itself.
I also think we can agree that one mistake doesn't disqualify you from leading.

[Deejay435]

hmm wasn't it Daniel and Vala who alerted the Ori to our presence lol

I might be wrong

No he should know that she is in command and should follow her, but his best friend also just died and like he says "I'm in a bad mood today" not much of a defence in a court martial though, but might explain why he was acting so recklessly

No, it was them.

I understand the personal reasons why Mitchell acted so recklessly. I just think that when you get to the rank of Lt. Colonel, and are supposed to be good enough to lead the team, you don't let personal reasons interfere with your work. Especially as a soldier, that's why they're trained so much.

But then, that gets into my complaints about how badly Mitchell has been written, and that's a subject for another thread.

[Lightsabre]

It can be argued Sam has exceptional leader skills as well. Leadership skills can be evaluated in many situations....special one-off missions, even training exercises.....it does not necessarily infer that his 'exceptional leadership skills' have been based upon lengthy command experience. From seeing Carter in action all these years, I would say that she definately has execptional leadership skills.....and stargate experience.

Possibly. But we haven't seen them.
Sam in command has been unsure, panicky, and apologetic.
Further, she's been borderline abusive to her team(paradise lost).
In some of the S8 eps, she did a good job, but that was mainly the 'soldier' eps, when they went in with an extraction mission, ala stronghold.
It seems that, give her a clear objective and time to plan, yes, she does a good job.
But send her into a situation like 'spirts' or 'gemini' and she does less than stellar work.

I don't recall mention of Cam becoming a Lt Col before Carter, but even if he were Lt. Col before Carter, that could just mean that there was more room for advancement on the path he was taking. Carter rec'd her promotion when Jack was promoted. Carter's promotion came when one was available on the path she was on. In all likelihood, she probably could have been promoted sooner and given her own command fo an SG team if she wanted......but who would want to bail out on the opportunity to serve on the number one team....I don't think that is something that can be held against her.

No, it's not something that can be held against her.
However, she reaps what she sowed. She made a decision to defer advancement for the prestige of being on the number one team.
Therefore, she cannot complain that she has less command experience than others of her rank and age.
That being the case, it might have been the better decision to go with Mitchell as he does have more comman experience.

To have 'exceptional leadership skills' does not infer that someone entirely new to the Stargate Program and off-world missions is prepared to lead in an entirely new setting.....even more-so when there are many qualified veterans around.

Possibly not, but it DOES mean he can do the job.

Cam must have good credentials to have been offered the command position in the first place, however, it always concerned me a bit that someone brand new to the stargate was placed in command of SG-1. Just as preference, I would rather have Sam leading due to her experience and "leadership skills", over the new guy. Nothing against Cam, just think it would be sensible to gain some experience under those who have been with the program for a while before leading the number 1 team.

Sam was not available when they decied on a leader.
How does this track tho.
The number one team must have hte best available, which is apparently Carter, yet it's fine for Mitchell to lead a different team of people, still called SG-1, still the flagship team?

[Uber]

Since Mitchell's never given Sam any orders, it's not possible for her to have disobeyed any of them.

When Sam was leading a mission...and everyone knew she was in charge of that operation...she gave him a direct order and he disobeyed it.

Please quote where Sam disregards one of Mitchell's non-existent orders.

[Lightsabre]

Since Mitchell's never given Sam any orders, it's not possible for her to have disobeyed any of them.

When Sam was leading a mission...and everyone knew she was in charge of that operation...she gave him a direct order and he disobeyed it.

Please quote where Sam disregards one of Mitchell's non-existent orders.

Prototype.
she specifically countermands his orders.

[Uber]

Prototype.
she specifically countermands his orders.

And what orders were those?

[CalmStorm]

@Lightsabre ....I will just have to agree to disagree. We obviously have different views of each character. There have been times in your discussion when I have to ask myself if we are talking about the same Sam, so I'll just leave it alone at this point.

Toodles for now on this subject

[Lightsabre]

Since Mitchell's never given Sam any orders, it's not possible for her to have disobeyed any of them.

When Sam was leading a mission...and everyone knew she was in charge of that operation...she gave him a direct order and he disobeyed it.

Please quote where Sam disregards one of Mitchell's non-existent orders.

Prototype.
she specifically countermands his orders.

[Lightsabre]

And what orders were those?

Mitchell orders the guys with them to set up the equipment.
Sam says 'no, we won't see anything till later'.
That is countermanding his orders.
It also undermines his command.

[Deejay435]

Possibly. But we haven't seen them.
Sam in command has been unsure, panicky, and apologetic.

What now? As we say over on CSI, please cite your source.

Further, she's been borderline abusive to her team(paradise lost).

Sam was in charge, and Dr. Lee made the decision to leave without her even being there. He deserved that dressing down.

[Lightsabre]

@Lightsabre ....I will just have to agree to disagree. We obviously have different views of each character. There have been times in your discussion when I have to ask myself if we are talking about the same Sam, so I'll just leave it alone at this point.

Toodles for now on this subject

That's fine. We have a different view on teh character.
No crime in it!

[Lightsabre]

What now? As we say over on CSI, please cite your source.

'Spirits', 'New Order', 'Gemini', 'Nightwalkers'(lied to her command).
That's about all off the top of my head.

Sam was in charge, and Dr. Lee made the decision to leave without her even being there. He deserved that dressing down.

Dr Lee said he was tired and they'd been at it for a long time.
Sam turned around and yelled at him.
You'd like it if your boss did that to you, would you?
You'd find it acceptable? say "Yup, I deserved that".
I doubt it.

[Uber]

Mitchell orders the guys with them to set up the equipment.
Sam says 'no, we won't see anything till later'.
That is countermanding his orders.
It also undermines his command.

BZZZZZZZT. Try again.

Here's the direct quote:

MITCHELL: Alright…let's see what all the fuss is about.

CARTER: Well we'll have to wait till night fall to get a visual confirmation of a black hole. In the mean time Major you can set up the gravity sensors… *SG-5 head off* I'll make sure we can dial home.

No orders were given here and she didn't countermand anything. She informed them that they wouldn't be able to see anything until nightfall and ordered the SG-5 Major to get things set up.

Conversely, this is what an order looks like...

CARTER: Cam wait for Backup! *Mitchell ignores it and keeps on going...Jackson and Carter rush up the hill after him*