Dai Li

"earth"

- Those men are agents of the Dai Li, the cultural authority of Ba Sing Se. They are the guardians of all our traditions.

The Dai Li were the secret and elite police of Ba Sing Se who worked to capture, interrogate, and imprison political dissidents. The organization was founded by Avatar Kyoshi hundreds of years ago with the aim of "protecting the cultural heritage of Ba Sing Se".

Unfortunately, the Dai Li became corrupt over time and did not fulfill the purposes proposed and intended by its founder. Long Feng was able to conspire with the Dai Li and effectively rule Ba Sing Se, reducing the position of the Earth King to nothing but a mere figurehead. The Dai Li's corruption and decadence was so advanced that they then came under the command of Princess Azula, relinquishing any loyalty to the Earth Kingdom and allowing the Fire Nation to capture Ba Sing Se with their cooperation.

Origin


The Dai Li was created several centuries ago by Avatar Kyoshi to preserve the cultural heritage of Ba Sing Se, in response to a peasant uprising against the government of the 46th Earth King. She currently regrets having created the Dai Li, as she had no idea how corrupt they would eventually become.

Modern history
Selectively picked at a young age, the agents of the Dai Li are elite officers of Ba Sing Se trained by and under the control of Long Feng. Since speaking of the War with the Fire Nation was against the law in Ba Sing Se, the Dai Li kept a close watch on all refugees and new immigrants to the city, removing anyone who dared to break the code of silence and brainwashing them under Lake Laogai.



When Team Avatar arrived in the city in hopes of informing Earth King Kuei on how to win the war against the Fire Nation, the Dai Li took immediate action to prevent this. They sent one of their agents, Joo Dee, posing as a tour guide, to tend to the Avatar and his friends, impeding their progress by delaying any visits to the Earth King. When the gang tried to infiltrate the Royal Palace during a party hosted by the king, the Dai Li immediately arrested them, and the gang learned of the Dai Li's corruption. They threatened to reveal the conspiracy to the city, which resulted in Long Feng blackmailing them with Appa's life, who at the time was missing. Team Avatar remained silent until Jet showed up in the city, offering to help them find Appa. In reality, he had been brainwashed into sending the group on a wild goose chase to Whale Tail Island, nowhere near Ba Sing Se. After realizing this, they brought Jet back into reality and with his help, they defeated the Dai Li at Lake Laogai in their attempt to save Appa. Unfortunately, Jet died at Long Feng's hands.

Appa eventually reunited with the gang after Prince Zuko freed him, in what was originally intended to be a kidnapping attempt. The gang then informed the Earth King of the conspiracy despite heavy resistance from the Dai Li and Palace guards. With knowledge of Long Feng's wrongful assumption of power, the Earth King had Long Feng arrested while the Dai Li were forced to serve the king. However, the organization maintained their loyalty to Long Feng. With the gang's help, the king then prepared for an attack on the Fire Nation.



During the Coup of Ba Sing Se, the Dai Li abandoned Long Feng and pledged loyalty to Azula. She also pointed out that, while earthbenders, the Dai Li possessed "a killer instinct that's so firebender". They swiftly placed all members of the Council of Five, the foremost authority of the Earth Kingdom Military, under house arrest, and they assisted in the Earth King's arrest as well. Later, when Aang and Katara battled with Zuko and Azula in the Crystal Catacombs of Ba Sing Se, it was ultimately the Dai Li's intervention that vanquished their hopes of victory and granted Azula the time she needed to strike down Aang. Upon her return to the Fire Nation, it was revealed that the Dai Li were ordered by Azula to destroy a portion of Ba Sing Se's Outer Wall, paving the way for a Fire Nation invasion of the entire city.

After Ba Sing Se was placed under firm Fire Nation control, Princess Azula promoted Dai Li agent Joo Dee to the position of "Supreme Bureaucratic Administrator" of the city, further cementing the Dai Li's unquestioned authority in the fallen city.



Allegiance to Princess Azula
After she returned to the Fire Nation, Azula apparently kept her command over the Dai Li. During the Invasion of the Fire Nation, when she was attacked by Sokka, Toph and Aang in the Fire Lord's secret bunker, but being powerless to bend due to the eclipse, she was aided by Dai Li agents, stating that when she left Ba Sing Se she "brought home some souvenirs". These agents were eventually defeated by the gang, but not before wasting a large portion of their time.

Upon the arrival of Sozin's Comet, Azula decided to banish the Dai Li for the minor mistake of taking five minutes to appear before her, stating that in that time an assassin could have easily killed her and escaped. She then implied that they could betray her, to which the group leader replied that they would never betray the princess. Azula ignored this, stating they probably told Long Feng the same thing before betraying him. She then banished them. At this point, Azula was descending into insanity and no longer trusted others after Mai and Ty Lee's betrayal.

Methods, equipment, and abilities


The Dai Li are highly skilled master earthbenders whose talents even surpass those of the Earthbender Guards of the Royal Palace. They wear gloves and shoes, both made out of earthen materials, in order to earthbend on the go. Their shoes also give them the ability to slide along the ground, increasing their speed. They are formidable earthbenders, as shown by the two agents who guarded Azula during the invasion and the capture of the Council of Five, leading to their successful coup.

The Dai Li are adept at using their stone shoes to cling to sheer rock surfaces, such as walls or ceilings. Mastery of this wall technique has been a part of their training ever since their inception and is therefore one of their most used skills. They carry a binding "weapon" called surveyors' chains within their robes, which they throw from their sleeves to ensnare and hold prisoners, particularly other earthbenders in order to inhibit their bending. They appear to use hypnosis to persuade rebels and uprisers such as Jet that there is no war within the walls of Ba Sing Se. Most of Ba Sing Se's citizens seem to fear them and want nothing to do with them, knowing that only trouble can arise from meddling in any of their affairs.

The Dai Li seem to be trained to work in pairs, which would give them greater strength and power than a single agent. This grouping of two can be seen when they attacked Toph at Lake Laogai, when they spied on Team Avatar as they left their house, when they protected Azula from Zuko's attack prior to his short imprisonment, and when they protected Azula again during the Day of Black Sun which helped her stall Team Avatar.

Trivia

 * Stories and poems in ancient China refer to secret polices that pretended to guard the emperor but, in the end, betrayed him and joined the enemy.
 * The Dai Li's costumes appear to be modeled after the government agents of Qing Dynasty China, and are named after Lieutenant General Dai Li (戴笠) The Head of the Chinese Military Intelligence Service (BIS) during World War II. His name, incidentally, meant "wear a li"; the li is the same style of conical hat that the Dai Li wear.
 * The Dai Li may have been based on various "secret police" forces in other works of fiction, such as the Thought Police from 1984 or the Fingermen from V for Vendetta. They can also be based on such non-fictional secret police such as the German Gestapo, the Stasi of East Germany, or the Soviet KGB. They may also be based on the Jingyi Wei, who were the imperial military secret police of the Ming dynasty who were bound to serve the emperor only; the Jingyi Wei conducted interrogations, dealt with military intelligence.
 * The Dai Li also appear to be very similar to the Praetorian Guard of Ancient Rome, which supposedly protected the emperor, but in more than one case controlled him, even murdering the insane Emperor Caligula.
 * Interestingly, "Dai" means "great" in both Vietnamese and Japanese.
 * "Dai Li" also means "to take care or control of" in Chinese.
 * The Dai Li agent who was training the Joo Dees was picked for the assignment because of his dazzling smile, which is the model for the permanent grin of every Joo Dee.
 * According to the show's creators, Republic City's Metalbending Police Force in The Legend of Korra was partially inspired by the Dai Li. Furthermore, the methods used by the police force bear similarities to those used by the Dai Li.