Cartwright

Admiral Cartwright was a high-ranking Starfleet officer in the 23rd century. In that capacity, he oversaw the efforts to protect Earth from a highly-destructive probe in 2286, and was a member of a conspiracy to sabotage peace talks between the Federation and the Klingon Empire.

Whale crisis
In 2286, when an extremely advanced probe of unknown origin began vaporizing Earth's oceans and ionizing its atmosphere, Cartwright acted as the Federation President's escort in Starfleet Command, supplying him with information and status updates. Cartwright initiated a Starfleet-wide red alert, and attempted to maintain communication with Admiral Kirk aboard a stolen Klingon Bird-of-Prey, who was attempting to initiate a plan wherein he would use time travel to retrieve two humpback whales with which to respond to the probe's transmissions. 

Conspiracy
Admiral Cartwright was a key player in the 2293 conspiracy to sabotage peace talks with the Klingon Empire. During a classified Starfleet briefing in which Captain Spock conveyed information on the weakened status of the Empire in the wake of the destruction of Praxis, Cartwright voiced his opinion that the prudent course of action would be to attack and bring the Klingons "to their knees," and that the abolition of the Klingon Neutral Zone would lead to a large influx of Klingons into Federation space. When Captain Kirk voiced his agreement that seeking peace with the Empire was an inappropriate course of action, Cartwright seized upon Kirk's prejudices to make him a scapegoat in the conspiracy to avert peace.

Cartwright and his conspirators subsequently framed Kirk and Doctor McCoy for the assassination of Klingon Chancellor Gorkon, and attempted to frame the Klingons for the assassination of the Federation President. Cartwright and the others were eventually exposed, however, by the crew of the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-A), and Cartwright was taken into custody by a security team from the USS Excelsior. 

Alternate reality
In 2258 of the alternate reality, after Kirk took command of the USS Enterprise (alternate reality) and helped save Earth and Captain from Nero, Cartwright was present at Kirk's promotion to captain of the Enterprise. 

Background
Admiral Cartwright was played by Brock Peters, who later played Joseph Sisko in several episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. The younger Cartwright in  was played by Errik Tustenuggee.

Early drafts of Star Trek IV had Admiral Morrow in the role later filled by Cartwright. In similar fashion, the Star Trek VI script had Cartwright's name listed as Donald.

Apocrypha
Several novels have established Cartwright's first name as Lance. The Star Trek: Section 31 novels also portray Admiral Cartwright as an agent of Section 31.

The Star Trek IV novelization shows that Cartwright replaced Morrow as Commander, Starfleet, in the time that Kirk and crew were on Vulcan, and Cartwright even comes to Vulcan to urge Kirk to return to Earth but Kirk refuses, until he is sure that Spock is alright.

The novel Cast No Shadow establishes that Cartwright died in prison in 2298 from an apparent respiratory infection, (though there was some suspicion he had been murdered), leaving Valeris as the last surviving Starfleet officer complicit in the Khitomer conspiracy.

His mirror universe counterpart appeared in the novel The Sorrows of Empire.

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