Musk and Hegseth vow to βmake Star Trek realβ but miss the showβs lessons
This week, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth touted their desire to βmake Star Trek realββwhile unconsciously reminding us of what the utopian science fiction franchise is fundamentally about.
Their Tuesday event was the latest in Hegsethβs ongoing βArsenal of Freedomβ tour, which was held at SpaceX headquarters in Starbase, Texas. (Itself a newly created town that takes its name from a term popularized by Star Trek.)
Neither Musk nor Hegseth seemed to recall that the βArsenal of Freedomβ phraseβat least in the context of Star Trekβis also the title of a 1988 episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. That episode depicts an AI-powered weapons system, and its automated salesman, which destroys an entire civilization and eventually threatens the crew of the USS Enterprise. (Some Trekkies made the connection, however.)

