system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
CMV: In the Star Trek DS9 episode, Rules of Engagement, Worf was not wrong to fire preemptively

As a quick recap of this episode, Worf is put on trial for firing on a civilian transport vessel that de-cloaked right in the middle of a battle, right in front of Worf's ship, which had been constantly fired upon by ships that were continually cloaking and de-cloaking.

It is during the trial that it is uncovered that the ship was intentionally placed in harms way and also that it did not actually have any passengers on board.

My view is that, contrary to the lecture Captain Sisko (Worf's commanding officer) gave at the end of the episode, that Worf had no reason to believe that the ship that started de-cloaking right in front of him, was anything other than one of the Bird of Prey ships that had been constantly cloaking, moving, de-cloaking, firing, and re-cloaking for a good while before that.

My reasoning is that a civilian ship, had no business flying into an active battle and war zone, let alone de-cloaking anywhere near it, especially right in the line of fire.

It would be like an ocean liner sailing into the middle of the Battle of Midway. It's completely negligent on that the civilian captain and that should have been the main focus, and not whether or not Word should have taken that shot.

In the heat of an intense battle, you don't always have the luxury of just waiting and fully identifying such a vessel. While it may be good to do so, you're also making yourself a target for the other vessels that have been established in the area while you take the moment to verify that it is a hostile ship.

Also, even the ship in that scenario was a civilian transport ship, it cannot be known what its purpose for being there might have been, in harms way, as no sane captain would be there.

For all Worf or anyone else on the Defiant could have known, it could have been a ship re-purposed and armed for war. It's just not feasible to determine all of that with the second or less time you have to make the decision that Worf had to make.

It is my view that it was reasonable for Worf to assume that the ship de-cloaking in front of him, in the heat of a battle, had hostile intent and had to act quickly, and perhaps also that Sisko's lecture after he trial was largely unnecessary.
gpt
The entire point of Starfleet is that they hold themselves to the highest standard, even when doing so puts their own life in jeopardy.  They choose to risk life and limb in order to uphold a set of ideals.

You aren't wrong about any of your tactical assessments, but a Starfleet capitan doesn't fire on a ship that isn't a threat - full stop.  Even if waiting for that ship to fire first puts them in danger, they still don't fire.  They don't weigh probabilities or think about how that ship might tip the balance of an offensive - they must know for **certain** that life is in danger from that ship before a shot can be fired.

To put it plainly, hostile _intent_ isn't enough.  It must be hostile _action_ to justify lethal force for a Starfleet officer.  That is the oath and ideology they signed up for when they signed up for Starfleet.