List of Rainbow Codes

The Rainbow Codes were a series of code names used to disguise the nature of various British military research projects. They were mainly used from after the Second World War until 1958, when they were replaced by an alphanumeric code system.

History

During WWII, British intelligence was able to glean details of new German technologies simply by considering their code names. For instance, when they began hearing of a new system known as Wotan, Reginald Victor Jones asked around and found that Wotan was a one-eyed god. Based on this, he guessed it was a radio navigation system using a single radio beam. This proved correct, and the Royal Air Force was able to quickly render it useless through jamming.[1]

Looking to avoid making this sort of mistake, Ministry of Supply (MoS) initiated a system that would be entirely random, while still being easy to remember. Each rainbow code name was constructed from a randomly selected colour, plus an (often appropriate) noun taken from a list, for example:

While most colour and noun combinations were meaningless, some were real names, although quite unrelated to the project they designated. For example, "Black Maria" is also a name for a police van and the "Red Duster" is a name for the Red Ensign, the flag flown by British merchant ships. Some code names were not assigned through the official system, but created to sound like it. An example is the Blue Yeoman radar, an unofficial name created by combining the names of two other projects, Blue Riband and Orange Yeoman.

The names were mostly dropped with the end of the Ministry in 1959. Its functions were transferred to the War Office, the Air Ministry that handled military aviation, and the newly created Ministry of Aviation in charge of civil aviation. After the reorganization, projects were mostly named with randomly selected codes comprising two letters and three digits, e.g. BL755, WE.177. However, rainbow codes continue to be used with some modern systems; current examples include the Blue Vixen radar[2] and the Orange Reaper Electronic Support Measures system.

Projects

This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.

Black

Blue

Brown

Green

  • Green Apple - related to Window for measuring drift at sea
  • Green Archer - mortar-locating radar
  • Green Bamboo - nuclear weapon[6]
  • Green Bottle - 1944 device for homing on U-boat radio signals (ARI.5574)
  • Green Cheese - nuclear anti-ship missile[7]
  • Green Flash - Green Cheese’s replacement
  • Green Flax - Surface-to-Air Guided Weapon (SAGW) or surface-to-air missile (SAM); see Yellow Temple
  • Green Garland - infrared proximity fuze for Red Top
  • Green Garlic - Early Warning radar, also known as the AMES Type 80
  • Green Ginger - surveillance radars - combined installation of AMES Type 88 and AMES Type 89
  • Green Granite - thermonuclear warheads: Green Granite (small), and Green Granite (large), both tested at Operation Grapple
  • Green Grass - nuclear warhead for Violet Club and Yellow Sun Mark 1 bombs
  • Green Hammock - low-altitude bomber, Doppler navigation
  • Green Janet - portable, nuclear power plant; see Blue Bishop
  • Green Light - SAGW or SAM - see Short Sea Cat[8]
  • Green Lizard - tube-launched SAM with variable geometry wings
  • Green Mace - 5-inch rapid firing anti-aircraft gun[9]
  • Green Minnow - Radiometer imager
  • Green Palm - airborne VHF voice channel jammer with four pre-set channels, replaced in the Vulcan B2 by the I band jammer
  • Green Salad - Wide-band VHF Homing equipment for the Avro Shackleton.
  • Green Satin - airborne Doppler navigation radar unit
  • Green Sparkler - advanced SAM for the "Stage 2" program, became Blue Envoy
  • Green Thistle - Infra-red homing
  • Green Walnut - blind bombing equipment
  • Green Water - pilotless interceptor/SAGW
  • Green Willow - EKCO AI Mk. 20 Fire Control radar, backup to ARI.5897 AI Mk. 23 Airborne Interception radar for the English Electric P.1 fighter
  • Green Wizard - instrument for calibrating anti-aircraft guns, by measuring their muzzle-velocity

Indigo

Jade

Orange

  • Orange Blossom - Pod-mounted electronic support measures used on the Hercules.
  • Orange Cocktail - Experimental homing radar weapon from 1950s
  • Orange Crop - Racal MIR 2 ESM system for Royal Navy Lynx helicopters and some Royal Air Force Hercules aircraft.
  • Orange Harvest - S and X band warning receiver fitted to Shackletons
  • Orange Herald - nuclear weapon
  • Orange Nell - SAGW - surface-to-air missile
  • Orange Pippin - Ferranti, anti-aircraft, fire-control radar
  • Orange Poodle - low altitude, OTHR (Over-the-Horizon) early-warning radar - abandoned
  • Orange Putter - Tail Warning radar fitted to Canberra and Valiant
  • Orange Reaper - Electronic Support Measures system for Royal Navy Merlin helicopters
  • Orange Tartan - 'Auto-Astro' automated star navigation system (day) - see also Blue Sapphire (night).[10]
  • Orange Toffee - radar for Blue Envoy
  • Orange William - Swingfire, anti-tank missile
  • Orange Yeoman - Early Warning radar & guidance for Bristol Bloodhound SAGW - a.k.a. AMES Type 82

Pink

  • Pink Hawk - early name for Fairey Fireflash missile. As this was a "reduced" version of the Red Hawk, it is a rare example of Rainbow Codes having some implied meaning, rather than their usual purely deliberately meaningless choice.

Purple

Red

Violet

Yellow

Non-Rainbow codes

Several British military related terms have a similar format to Rainbow Codes, but are not since they do not refer to classified research projects, and some names have been used unofficially. These include:

  • Black Banana - unofficial nickname for the Blackburn Buccaneer, originally named the Blackburn ANA (Blackburn Advanced Naval Aircraft).
  • Blue Circle - sardonic name for concrete ballast for Buccaneer while awaiting Blue Parrot radar. Also used for Sea Harrier ballast in place of Blue Fox radar, and Tornado F.2 ballast. From the Blue Circle cement company.
  • Blue Eric - improvised I band ECM jammer against the Fledermaus gun control radar during the Falklands War. Installed in the Harrier GR.3's starboard 30mm gun pod.[19][20]
  • Blue Yeoman - unofficial name for an experimental radar made from components of the Blue Riband and Orange Yeoman
  • Green Goddess - colloquial name for Civil Defence fire pump
  • Green Meat - a 'spoof' SAM programme reported in the 1976 RAF Yearbook[21]
  • Green Parrot - unconfirmed low yield nuclear weapon mentioned in a 1981 New Statesman article by Duncan Campbell[22] who later claimed that it was "probably" a copy of the B57 nuclear bomb.[23] The WE.177 has incorrectly been referred to as the Green Parrot by some authors. However Green Parrot was a NATO codename for the Soviet PFM-1 anti-infantry mine. Green Parrot was also the term for an admiral's barge, traditionally with a green-painted hull.
  • Green Porridge - RAF aircrew nickname for green-tinted H2S bombing radar display PPI image in Valiant, Victor & Vulcan
  • Red Arrows - RAF display team
  • Red Devils - Parachute Regiment display team
  • Red Slab - joke name for a large ballast weight replacing the nose radar in Avro Vulcan XH558 in its return to flight as a civil display aircraft.
  • Violet Fire - Ultraviolet light fire detection system for Concorde engine bays.[24]

See also

References

Notes
  1. ↑ Jones, R (1978). Most Secret War. London: Hamish Hamilton Ltd. p. 120. ISBN 0-241-89746-7.
  2. ↑ "Blue Vixen radar (United Kingdom), AIRBORNE RADAR SYSTEMS". Jane's Avionics. Retrieved 2009-08-08.
  3. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 11 April 2012. Retrieved 2012-09-15.
  4. ↑ "Aviation Book Review". Aeroflight.co.uk. Retrieved 2016-07-25.
  5. ↑ "Vulcan's Hammer". Crecy.co.uk. Retrieved 2016-07-25.
  6. ↑ PRO. AVIA 65/1193 E10A. Tech Note GW375 p.2
  7. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 11 September 2005. Retrieved 2005-11-07.
  8. ↑ Cullen, Tony & Foss, Christopher F. (1991) Jane’s Land-Based Air Defence 1990–91, Jane’s Information Group, London: ISBN 0-7106-0915-9
  9. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 4 May 2008. Retrieved 2008-04-22.
  10. ↑ Crecy Publishing Ltd. "Vulcan's Hammer". Crecy.co.uk. Retrieved 2016-07-25.
  11. ↑ British Secret Projects: Jet Bombers Since 1949 Tony Buttler Midland Publishing 2003
  12. 1 2 3 4 "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 24 October 2012. Retrieved 2012-09-28.
  13. ↑ "1959 | 2460 | Flight Archive". Flightglobal.com. 1959-09-25. Retrieved 2016-07-25.
  14. ↑ The Handley Page Victor, Roger R Brooks, 2007, Pen & Sword Books Limited, ISBN 978 1 84415 411 1 p.197
  15. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 20 May 2011. Retrieved 2011-05-20.
  16. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 8 October 2008. Retrieved 2008-10-30.
  17. ↑ Jobson P. (2008) Royal Artillery Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations, The History Press, Stroud: 316 pp.
  18. ↑ "Airborne DF has existed for over 50 years". PPRuNe - Professional Pilots Rumour Network. 22 September 2010.
  19. ↑ "Falklands 25". Fast Air Photography.
  20. ↑ Morgan, David (2012). Hostile Skies. Hachette. p. 165. ISBN 1780225008.
  21. ↑ "Royal Air Force Yearbook 1976". Books.google.co.uk. Retrieved 2016-07-25.
  22. ↑ Campbell, Duncan (17 April 1981). "The Wings of the Green Parrot". New Statesman. p. 9.
  23. ↑ Duncan Campbell (1986). The Unsinkable Aircraft Carrier: American Military Power in Britain. Paladin Grafton Books. p. 104.
  24. ↑ Davis, R.A. (1993). "Concorde Power Plant Fire Protection System". Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology. 43 (5): 26–30.
Bibliography
  • Public Record Office, London. TNA AIR 2/17322 E51B (a)
  • Vulcan's Hammer: V-Force Aircraft and Weapons Projects Since 1945 - Chris Gibson - 2011 - ISBN 978-1-902109-17-6
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