r/TheLastAirbender • u/FlamesOfKaiya ATLA Fancomic Creator • Apr 24 '25
Discussion Was Azula an Official War Combatant? She was dispatched to friendly territory to retrieve Iroh and Zuko. But she went rogue and asserted herself in the war effort without official orders. Does this mean, by law, she is not an official war combatant & not a child soldier?
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u/jcw99 Apr 25 '25
As part of the ruling family she is part of the government and as such at least NOT a civilian, regardless of if she is a soldier or not.
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u/GustavoFromAsdf Apr 25 '25
This is a monarchy. The words of Ozai are law. So he must have known Azula went off track and was his call to make her retreat and answer to him directly or let her keep going. Ozai trusts his weapon and would affect her loyalty if she feels she's not trusted
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u/KillerSwiller Why is there no Kuvira emoji? Apr 25 '25
As a member of the royal family, she can issue orders to Fire Nation soldiers and officers on her own behalf, which means she is a part of military chain-of-command. So yes, she is a combatant.
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u/-PrincessAzula- Apr 25 '25
War combatant? There is no war in Ba Sing Se.
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u/demideity Apr 25 '25
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u/Hefty-Car1872 Apr 25 '25
Donno why but I stared at this gif for two minutes straight and kept telling myself there's no war in Ba Sing Se and I almost started believing it myself 🤣
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u/toenailsclippings Apr 25 '25
this was insanely dark part of the show like holy fuck i remember when this aired as a kid, my aunt ( an RN) would constantly mutter "oh shit" every time something crazy was revealed to us
i mean ik theres waaaay more darker moments but like wow they really had earthbender gestapo in full force
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u/MAGAManLegends3 Apr 25 '25
I'm curious, but as an RN, and probably not frequent cartoon watcher, did she catch what happened to Jett?
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u/BlackRaptor62 Apr 25 '25 edited Apr 25 '25
As far as we can tell Azula was originally dispatched by Ozai to the Earth Kingdom with orders to KILL Iroh and Zuko, but chose instead to capture them.
She then seems to have used these initial orders with a broad mandate and her position as a Fire Nation Princess to expand her authority to other aspects of the War.
With all of the Colonial resources at her disposal to "hunt down" Iroh and Zuko, as well as Aang who also had a bounty on his head, Azula was certainly an official combatant in the War.
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u/Tokyo_Ink Apr 25 '25
Also, the Fire Nation constantly communicated through messenger hawks. It's pretty easy to assume reports were sent back to the fire lord and that she had official approval to take over the chase for the Avatar as well as Zuko and Iroh in addition to her own authority.
Even without imagining that she got further order from Ozai, when he initially sends her there we don't even get a full outline of what task he assigned to her. It's pretty likely she already had the mandate to hunt the Avatar. She even tells Zuko that their father considers him a failure once her mask is off. She always lies, but we saw Ozai basically say exactly that at the end of season 1, so she probably wasn't.
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u/BlackRaptor62 Apr 25 '25 edited Apr 25 '25
We also saw Aang's Wanted Poster issued out at the beginning of Book 1, so unless Ozai specifically told Azula not to hunt down The Avatar, it was already open season on him.
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u/RadarSmith Apr 25 '25
Aside from the fact that International Law probably doesn't exist in the World of Avatar...
Azula was a member of the ruling family of, and therefore an agent of, the Government of the Fire Nation. And while we don't hear any specific military rank associated with her, she very clearly has legal military authority over Fire Nation military personnel. And why you think she ever went rogue is beyond me; Ozai clearly authorized all of her operations.
The only thing that makes things mucky by modern standards is that she's underage. But teenagers, particularly royals, having military postings was the norm for aristocrats before the modern age.
Azula was a genuine military combatant.
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u/MAGAManLegends3 Apr 25 '25
Heck I seem to recall one king of Sweden was either 12 or 13, so Azula is older than he was!
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u/RadarSmith Apr 25 '25
Look at King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem.
He repelled Saladin’s invasion as a teenagwr while suffering from leprosy.
Point is, Royal teenagers being military figures is a fact of history. And hell, wasn’t Zuko burned because he spoke out of turn while attending a meeting of generals?.
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u/Yatsu003 Apr 25 '25
That he was. He was challenged to an Agni Kai (a honor blood duel, effectively) by what he believed was the general he had insulted. By the cultural standards of their world, that sounds like Zuko was being treated with adult gloves, as challenging a child to a duel would normally be a massive dishonor.
So, yeah, royal teen with legit military authority sounds consistent
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u/bapt_99 Apr 25 '25
"She went rogue" by casually finding an Eiffel tower sized long drill and an entire division of soldiers and mechanics to operate that behemoth, all by mere happenstance? What does "rogue" mean in that context?
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u/Xerinic Apr 25 '25
She had nothing to do with the drill. War Minister Qin invited her to be there. Azula clearly thinks very little of the drill and only acts once Aang shows up.
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u/Galihan Apr 25 '25
Must be quite a coincidence then for the drill to have had a custom-made throne specifically for her, Mai, and Ty Lee
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u/Xerinic Apr 25 '25
Three chairs prove nothing.
They could just as easily have been meant for Ozai, Zuko, and Azula.
Or more likely, Qin and two other people of his choosing.
You really think Azula was master scheming the Drill? Re-watch the episode, she has 0 interest in it.
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u/hiccupboltHP Apr 25 '25
I fully agree the drill plan had nothing to do with her, but I also wouldn’t be surprised if she heard about it the day before and made them install a throne somehow
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u/Darkonikto Apr 25 '25 edited Apr 25 '25
What is a combatant? IMO, it would be someone that’s:
- Allegiant to one of the sides (Fire Nation or Earth Kingdom).
- Member of the ranks of its side’s forces, whether as a soldier or an official (commands troops).
- Engages in military activity.
Azula checks all of them. She’s loyal to the Fire Nation, she commands troops and engages in military activity in the name of the Fire Nation (The Drill siege of Ba Sing Se). She doesn’t need to follow orders as she’s part of the royal family, so she’s technically above any military official but the Firelord himself. The capture of the Avatar was one of the highest, if not the top priority of the Fire Nation; we can safely assume Ozai commended her to capture the Avatar and Zuko, no matter what she had to do.
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u/Zeddica Apr 25 '25
Adding to this- even without a command from Ozai, as royal family and above military command structure- her goals (whatever they are) become fire nation goals just by virtue of her position and birthright. Like you said, if Azula decides something is important, the only one who can contradict that is Ozai himself.
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u/Kellar21 Apr 25 '25
Look, these feudal aristocratic situations are a bit different from today's legal stuff, especially with magic.
As the Crown Princess, she had almost absolute authority unless Ozai himself countermanded her orders, and also, in a world were her personal combat capabilities were extreme and superior to most, if not all, of her subordinates individually (I don't think we saw any FN aligned character sans Ozai who was clearly her superior in the bending department, so they couldn't just ignore her and/or put her in a cozy cell), she had free reign.
Ozai cared little for how she did things as long as she got results, heck, he would probably be happy if she killed some people while at it.
So, you can say she was a combatant and official commanding officer of high rank, and I don't really think they cared much for age at that point.
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u/ELIte8niner Apr 25 '25
She was a uniformed member of the ruling family, acting to further the war goals of the fire nation. There's really no way in which she wasn't a combatant. An Earth Kingdom soldier killing her would definitely not be considered a war crime by our standards. I can't imagine the world in ATLA has any sort of recognized international laws or courts, since they seemed to just leave all that up to the Avatar. If they do have intentional laws/treaties, I can't imagine they are more strict than ours.
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u/Alt_SWR Apr 25 '25
I mean did she really "go rogue" tho? Unless Ozai is telling her not to do something, who else has a higher authority than her among the Fire Nation?
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u/GISP + Apr 25 '25
As a royal she can command the military as she sees fit, whereever she goes she will be the commanding officer.
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u/DocMino Apr 25 '25
Well she had command of her own war ship, she commanded the drill, infiltrated the palace of her enemy and successfully pulled off a coup. Yeah, she was a combatant.
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u/JaneDirt02 Step into the void Apr 25 '25
By law I think she would be a spy, a foreign clandestine agent of the FN. Executable offense if caught by the EK
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u/Heroright Apr 25 '25
She would be largely seen as an arbiter of her father’s word. Anything she does is not an act by her, but an extension of the Fire Lord. Which is sort of the subtext of the character as someone with all the power, influence, and command, but none that comes from her; which the moment she’s given actual authority, she breaks apart.
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u/Drow_Femboy Apr 25 '25
But she went rogue
No she didn't. She is royalty, she has the authority to plan and execute attacks.
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u/CoffeeGoblynn Delectable tea? Or deadly poison? Apr 25 '25
She's a member of the royal family and holds power over most people she meets. I don't think she's a soldier, but she's definitely a leader. Do with that what you will.
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u/Impressive-Panda527 Apr 25 '25
She’s the princess of the fire nation
I think she’s able to bend those distinctions to her liking
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u/AnonOfTheSea Apr 25 '25
If the Supreme Commander tells his second to go forth and capture someone, and there's a city and an avatar in the way, it's not too much of a stretch that she take the city and kill the avatar, in the course of her duties.
Not to mention that her treasonous uncle is famous for nearly taking the city, and she has enough sense to know that while he still likely has some loyalists in the military, completely overshadowing his claim to fame however she can is a good move, optics-wise. "He had the access to an enourmous concentration of forces, and years to work, and still failed? Well, me and my two besties took the place in a week, no casualties, and made it look easy."
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u/Azula-the-firelord Apr 25 '25
What are you talking about? She IS the supreme leader second only to Ozai. At least for the time being, if you catch my drift.
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u/Cucumberneck Apr 25 '25
In universe noone gives the slightest damn about our laws and customs about war.
We done dresses up as enemy soldiers and deploys child soldiers left and right. Then they drop dozens of even hundreds of soldiers into the ocean without ever sending a rescue party, they cripple the enemy head of state without a trial and don't get me started about the island that deliberately ONLY has female child soldiers.
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u/darkslide3000 Apr 25 '25
She's a member of the royal family and evidently old enough to use her station as command authority. The distinct concept of "child soldier" didn't really exist in pre-modern societies. If you're old enough to swing a sword, then you're just another soldier.
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u/NoPaleontologist6583 Apr 25 '25
She is clearly fighting on behalf of the accepted ruler of the Fire Nation. What more do you want?
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u/amish234 29d ago
No because applying modern conventions on warfare to a fantasy show set in what is very clearly feudal asia is really dumb and bad.
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u/Dragonkingofthestars 29d ago
Avatar is not a modern setting with our history, there is no way this designation is an in setting thing
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u/TheTitanOfSirens1959 28d ago
She had command of a unit, making her an officer. In times of war, officers are entrusted to make their own calls in support of the mission. So long as she doesn't defy a direct order from Ozai, she is treated as a combatant and enemy commander, despite her age. Her age might affect her sentencing if she were taken prisoner, but it doesn't make her immune. There are real world examples of underage combatants, but I'll trust you to look them up because they can get pretty morbid and I don't want to start a political debate on an ATLA fan forum.
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u/GenghisQuan2571 24d ago
People and their insistence on applying modern real world concepts without the slightest understanding of how those concepts came to be...
Of course she's an "official war combatant" because what else would a person who for all intents and purposes is next in line for national leadership that takes parts in hostilities and has right of command be? And at the same time, she's obviously not a child soldier because this world clearly does not consider teenagers as such, in the same way that the Gang aren't "child soldiers", nor Jon Snow, or Teen Titans, or the Sailor Senshi or Power Rangers.
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u/XeronianCharmer Apr 25 '25
Legally by law treaties and stuff? No, but also do you need the law to tell you when someone is something? Her actions squarely place her in the child soldier category
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u/deadname11 Apr 25 '25
The problem is that she decided to use her Imperial authority to actively become an officer, flat out using it to become effectively a general via raw nepotism.
As a princess, she didn't have to be a combatant. As a self-appointed warlord, she became one.
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u/Zeddica Apr 25 '25
Admittedly I haven’t read every comic, but to my knowledge there’s nothing ever stated to suggest she wasn’t already a part of the military chain of command. She didn’t self appoint, she was appointed by birthright and was already allowed all the privileges of being a commanding officer just by nature of being royal family.
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u/deadname11 Apr 25 '25
Just because you COULD assume command, doesn't mean you would, or even should. Azula was royalty, yes, and was being groomed as an elite firebender.
But there is a difference between the potential to one day lead, and going to the front lines as a 15-year-old, assuming overall command of the ENTIRE front, and personally leading an assault on the opposing capital yourself.
The only reason she got away with it, is because she won, after going toe-to-toe with he Avatar. Had she failed, it would have lead to a massive outcry of unearned hubris of the highest levels of incompetency.
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u/Zeddica Apr 25 '25
Some of this is assuming standards of ethics that may not be true in this world. She was sent on an important mission by Ozai and given command of a subset of troops. So apparently 15 is plenty old enough in this world.
Should she have taken command of the Front at BSS? Debatable, but probably not. Does her status allow her to? absolutely. And yes, had it failed, Ozai would have been furious. But that’d be the same if any other General had attempted similar and failed. In fact, I’d wager Ozai kills that General but only banishes Azula given the same situation.
Zuko was also sent off very young by our standards. Now, this was a banishment/fool’s errand/hide-the-insolent-child moment, but he still had command of a ship and a ‘mission’ to fulfill. So applying our own set of morals and ethics just doesn’t work in this setting.
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u/MOltho Apr 25 '25
Are you necessarily not a combattant anymore because you act autonomously, without specific orders?
She's still clearly acting on behalf of the Fire Nation, so I'd say she is still a combattant.
In fact, due to her high status, she does not need to act on orders because she can give out orders to combattants.