Dalek Strategist

Dalek Strategist was a position in the Dalek hierarchy. Under normal circumstances, the Strategists advised Dalek leaders. If a situation were to become compromised, then the Strategists took operational command of a mission. (AUDIO: Mutually Assured Destruction)

Pre-Time War
Dalek strategists reasoned that the position of Spiridon would make the planet a good staging post for an invasion of the Galactic Core, and accordingly stored a vast Dalek army in artificial hibernation within the planet's network of caves. (PROSE: Dalek: The Astounding Untold History of the Greatest Enemies of the Universe)

Dalek Strategists operated on a Dalek time fleet within the Time Vortex. When the Temporal Extinction Device malfunctioned, the Supreme Dalek sent three Strategists and one Pilot Dalek through a time corridor to escape safely and plan a rescue attempt. Two of the Strategists escaped while the third Strategist was killed when the corridor was collapsed by time wind. (AUDIO: The Time of the Daleks)

Dalek Time Controller
The Dalek Time Controller, also known under the alias of the Dalek Litigator, had first encountered the Eleventh Doctor during the New Dalek Paradigm's Dalek Foundation plot (PROSE: The Dalek Generation) before meeting the Sixth Doctor - whose encounter here was the Doctor's first meeting with the Dalek Time Controller (AUDIO: Patient Zero) - and going on to fight the Eighth Doctor on multiple occasions. (AUDIO: Lucie Miller, To the Death, X and the Daleks, The Traitor) The Time Controller participated in the 2180s Dalek invasion of Earth, where the Doctor observed that he controlled Dalek war strategies as they traveled through time, with Susan Campbell identifying him as the Dalek strategist. (AUDIO: To the Death)

After being infected with retro-genitor particles, (AUDIO: The Monster of Montmartre) as a result of existing outside of time during several changes to history, (AUDIO: X and the Daleks, The Traitor) the Dalek Time Controller was expelled from the Dalek Empire. (AUDIO: The Monster of Montmartre) After an alliance with broke down, (AUDIO: Master of the Daleks) the Time Controller, along with Markus Schriver and Molly O'Sullivan, fused its consciousness with theirs and became the Eminence. (AUDIO: Eye of Darkness)

Restoration Empire
In the Dalek Restoration Empire, an elite unit was the Dalek Prime Strategist who served as an advisor to the Emperor of the Restoration. The Strategist once claimed to the Tenth Doctor that he was "older than the Emperor himself", to which the Doctor replayed with a skeptical quip; (COMIC: Defender of the Daleks) there were indeed accounts which portrayed the Golden Emperor as the first Dalek created, (COMIC: Genesis of Evil, et. al) but the Dalek Emperor who acted as the Prime Strategist's immediate superior was not the same individual as that original Golden Emperor, but a later pretender to the throne. (PROSE: The Guide to the Dark Times) River Song merely recorded in The Dark Times Times that the Prime Strategist had "existed for a very long time", calling him "ancient". (PROSE: The Guide to the Dark Times)

Following the loss of the Dalek Time Squad, the Strategist predicted that the Emperor would begin a war between the Daleks and Time Lords. He resolved to escape to aid the Emperor, or to replace him if he proved ineffective as the Strategist suspected he might, and used the Kotturuh crystals that he had stored in his casing to power an emergency temporal shift. (PROSE: Exit Strategy)

Last Great Time War
Following the loss of the Dalek Time Controller, the Dalek Empire created the Dalek Time Strategists to coordinate their forces in a temporal conflict. (AUDIO: The Monster of Montmartre) One of them attained the coveted position of second-in-command of the empire, serving as an advisor to the Dalek Emperor during the Last Great Time War. (AUDIO: Temmosus)

New Dalek Paradigm


Upon the establishment of the New Dalek Paradigm, new Strategist Daleks were distinguished by their blue casings. The original Strategist, along with the other original four Paradigm Daleks (the white Supreme, yellow Eternal, orange Scientist, and red Drone), were created when the three survivors of the New Dalek Empire tricked the Eleventh Doctor into allowing them to activate the Progenitor device. The original Strategist's first act was to exterminate two of its predecessors (a painted "Ironside" and its unpainted comrade). It escaped through a time corridor with the others and went on to help rebuild the Daleks. (TV: Victory of the Daleks)

Later, a number of Strategists would be seen in the Supreme Council Chamber on a restored Kaalann, alongside the new Dalek Emperor, who was also coloured blue. (GAME: City of the Daleks)

A Chief Strategist, one of a higher rank of Strategist Daleks, was in command of the platoon that attacked Station 7, with several other Strategists, Scientists and Drones under its leadership. It knew of the plans by the SSS agents on Station 7 to use captive Daleks to fight them, and let the humans believe their strategy would work until the last minute. Under this operation, another Strategist commanded Search Squad Delta. (COMIC: The Only Good Dalek) When the Daleks reintroduced the bronze casing for standard Dalek foot soldiers, a Black Dalek took up a similar role. (COMIC: The Dalek Project)

Strategist Daleks led Drones as the Daleks fought to protect their weapons bases from the Silurians, Sontarans and Cybermen. (GAME: Dalek Supremacy)

Several Strategists were present in the Dalek Emperor's flagship when the Daleks invaded Earth with a piece of the Eternity Clock in 2106. River Song was chased by one of the Strategists in a devastated London as she traversed a ruined building. (GAME: The Eternity Clock)

Upon the establishment of the Parliament of the Daleks, based on the spacecraft Nacrana Va Hateen, the Dalek Strategists' purpose was to channel the mental capacities of the thousands of Dalek governors and then present them as options to the Dalek Prime Minister, who could then instruct the Supreme Dalek. The Parliament's deliberations were highly classified, its sessions barely even recorded on the Dalek pathweb. However, as with administrations the galaxy over, there were leaks, both deliberate and accidental. (PROSE: Dalek Combat Training Manual, Dalek: The Astounding Untold History of the Greatest Enemies of the Universe)

When the Doctor, Amy Pond and Rory Williams were transported to the spaceship of the Dalek Parliament, at least one Strategist was present amongst the Parliament members. By this time, the colour of the Strategist class’ casing had been altered to a much darker, more metallic shade of blue. (TV: Asylum of the Daleks)

Other references
In other instances, reference to Dalek strategy was made with no visibly distinguished strategists present.

Just prior to the invasion of Earth in 200,100, a Dalek announced that the Dalek stratagem neared completion. (TV: Bad Wolf)

In 1930, when the Cult of Skaro created an army of Dalek-Humans in New York City on Earth, Dalek Sec was to be designated Controller. However, the now Human-Dalek Sec was overthrown by his fellow Cult members. Recognising that "war demand[ed] strategy", Dalek Caan designated himself Controller for a planned invasion of Manhattan, connecting to a military computer which allowed him to take control of the new army. When the Dalek-humans turned against the Cult of Skaro, Caan used his connection to kill them before abandoning his post. (TV: Evolution of the Daleks)

When the Dalek Death Squad spacecraft, crewed by a Dalek Death Squad of bronze Daleks, received a Reconnaissance Scout Signal, their leader gave the order to "strategise". (TV: Revolution of the Daleks) During their attempted execution of the Thirteenth Doctor, a Dalek Executioner insisted to her that Dalek strategy was "supreme". (TV: Eve of the Daleks)