“The Wrath of Khan” opens with Starfleet cadet Saavik (Kirstie Alley) taking a battle simulation check referred to as the Kobayashi Maru. In mentioned check, the cadet role-plays as a starship captain who has to rescue the eponymous ship trapped in Klingon territory. When you do not rescue the ship, the Kobayashi Maru crew dies. When you attempt to rescue it, Klingons seem and your crew dies. As defined later, the check is unwinnable and designed to show cadets about no-win situations. Kirk, although, cheated when he took the check, for he would not imagine in no-win situations. The movie is designed to check that perception.
In the course of the first battle with Khan, the Enterprise is disabled. Kirk pulls a last-minute ploy, transmitting a code to disable Reliant’s shields. If it fails, the Enterprise is doomed. Fortunately, as with so a lot of Kirk’s gambles, the plan works. It isn’t utterly a successful hand, although. Because of the assault, one of many engineering cadets, Scotty’s (James Doohan) nephew Peter, is useless, foreshadowing the soon-to-come sacrifice that can break Kirk’s coronary heart.
When Khan units the disabled Reliant to detonate, Spock exposes himself to deadly radiation to reactivate the Enterprise’s warp drive. The parallels between this and the Kobayashi Maru check are spelled out when the dying Spock admits to Kirk that he by no means took the check earlier than: “What do you consider my resolution?”
This deal with the no-win state of affairs is one other manner that “The Wrath of Khan” is targeted on penalties. Not each end result generally is a flawlessly executed Corbomite Maneuver, and generally individuals die due to that.