The world of Star Trek is not averse to a little emotion. In fact, some of the franchise’s best episodes centered around deep, tear-jerking topics. The TNG episode “The Inner Light” is known for this, breaking down the walls of the stoic and stern Captain Picard, to reveal the emotional man beneath. The writers knew they had struck gold and went on to post their most emotionally reserved or seemingly unfeeling characters in situations that could make an adult Klingon cry, they did this masterfully on the sidelines during Deep space 9, with the character of Legate Damar.
Damar was a Cardassian, a race of aliens known for their brutality and indifference. He was also second to Gul Dukat, the head of the Cardassian Union and all around pain in the back of the Federation. Damar served alongside Dukat for years, earning his place alongside the commander when the Cardassians formed their alliance with the Dominion during the aptly named Dominion War. He was reliable and loyal, not only to Dukat, but also to his family, with a wife and children on Cardassia, their homeworld.
This all went horribly wrong when Dukat lost his daughter and fell into mental instability, quickly rendering him unfit to rule. As his right-hand man, Damar was thrown into rule, a task that weighed heavily on his head. He reportedly drank a lot because he was under pressure to command an entire race of humans in times of war against some of the most powerful humans in the galaxy: the Federation. His alcohol use got worse as the war progressed, seeing large numbers of his people thrown into battles they couldn’t win. The Dominion began to treat the Cardassians more and more like cannon fodder, the replaceable grunts they could throw at the enemy without much care.
Damar was forced to let this happen, powerless to stand up to the rule, until the Dominion brought the Breen into their alliance without consulting him. A notoriously filthy humanoid race, the Breen were granted access to the Dominion database despite Damar’s objections, which contained all of the Cardassians’ military and political secrets. This was the last straw for Damar and he formed the Cardassian Rebellion.
Damar recovered, sobered up and led attacks on vital Dominion facilities. These attacks resulted in many Cardassian deaths, but Damar stood his ground and made it clear that his people were not slaves and that they were fed up with the Dominion’s iron fist. Although his attacks gave the Federation more time, it still went badly for them. Damar tried his best to help, but lacked the proper guerrilla warfare tactics needed to really make a dent. This is where the Federation came in and the… DS9 officer and ex-bajoran guerrilla fighter Kira Nerys to aid in his efforts. She trained Damar and his men to effectively push back against their oppressors.
Complicating this situation is that Nerys and her fellow Bajorans learned these techniques by fighting back against their old oppressors, the Cardassians themselves. Damar’s people had occupied Bajor not so long ago for their resources. Cardassian officers similar to Damar tortured and killed the Bajorans on a regular basis, Dukat himself being the leader of the operation. While current DS9 security officer Odo was there at the time, he did not participate and instead tried to reduce the Cardassian blows. Despite this, and seeing Damar now desperately trying to protect his own people, including his wife and children, Nerys puts these old grievances aside and helps him. This is where the first devastating blow hits Damar, when he receives a message that his entire family is dead. He sums it up best:
“They were not part of this uprising. The Dominion knew that […] To kill her and my son… the casual brutality of it… the waste of life. What kind of state tolerates the murder of innocent women and children? What kind of people give those orders?”
It is a profound and moving scene, the pain over Damar’s face. However, the whole situation changes when Nerys replies, “Yes, Damar, what kind of people give those orders?” This naturally angers him, not just because of the personal attack, but because he knows it to be true, realizing all the pain his people have caused the Bajorans over the years. He is devastated by the deaths of his loved ones, and he struggles to understand how anyone could do such a thing until he realizes that his own people can. Nerys quickly tries to take back what she said, but Garak, the Cardassian tailor aboard the space station, stops her and tells her this was what he needed to hear.
This moment is where Damar changes, realizing that he had to take responsibility for the atrocities committed by his people, and finally felt the pain they caused. He becomes the leader Cardassia needs, not a warmonger but a true leader, ready to make amends and rejoin the intergalactic community they’ve always shunned because they thought they were better. But before all this can happen, the Dominion War must be settled. The Cardassian Resistance manages to deliver a blow, knock out power and cut communication, allowing the Federation and the morally complex Captain Sisko to finally go on the offensive. The Dominion are eventually driven back, but they do not go down without a fight and they enact the full xenocide of the Cardassians.
In a relatively short time, 800 million Cardassians were killed. One of the last acts of the war is that Damar leads an attack against the Dominion, causing him to be shot down by an enemy Jem’Hadar. His death is swift, but painful, not just for the man himself, but for all of Cardassia. With him they had the chance to rebuild and atone for the sins of their past. He became an inspirational leader through his grief, and was their best chance at finding peace, but with his death, surrounded by his fallen siblings on their broken and dying homeworld, there is what may have been Cardassia’s last chance. They seem doomed to repeat their history of the police state, if they can ever recover.
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