Rainbow Code

British military research project code names


title: "Rainbow Code" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["rainbow-code", "cold-war-military-equipment-of-the-united-kingdom", "united-kingdom-defence-procurement", "lists-of-names"] description: "British military research project code names" topic_path: "geography/united-kingdom" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_Code" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary British military research project code names ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d8/Yrjö_modified_AA_No_3_Mk_7_F_radar_Hämeenlinna_1.JPG" caption="AA No. 3 Mk. 7 mobile anti-aircraft radar, nicknamed "Blue Cedar.""] ::

The Rainbow Codes were a series of code names used to disguise the nature of various British military research projects. They were mainly used by the Ministry of Supply from the end of the Second World War until 1958, when the ministry was broken up and its functions distributed among the forces. The codes were replaced by an alphanumeric code system, consisting of two letters followed by three digits.

History

During World War II, British intelligence was able to glean details of new German technologies simply by considering their code names. For instance, when they heard 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.

Wishing to avoid making this sort of mistake, the Ministry of Supply (MoS) initiated a system that would be entirely random and deliberately unrelated to the program in any way, 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 combinations produced real names, although quite unrelated to the project they designated. For example, "Black Maria" is also a nickname for a police van and the "Red Duster" is a nickname 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. The Blue Yeoman radar is an example, 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 split between the War Office, the Air Ministry, and the newly created Ministry of Aviation, which was responsible for civil aviation. After the reorganization, projects were mostly named with randomly selected codes comprising two letters and three digits, e.g. BL755, WE.177. Rainbow codes, or at least names that look like them without being official, have occasionally been used for some modern systems; current examples include the Orange Reaper electronic support measures system and the Blue Vixen radar{{cite web | publisher = Jane's Avionics | title = Blue Vixen radar (United Kingdom), Airborne Radar Systems | url=http://www.janes.com/articles/Janes-Avionics/Blue-Vixen-radar-United-Kingdom.html | access-date = 2009-08-08 }}—the latter most likely so named because it was a replacement for the Blue Fox radar.

Projects

Black

Blue

Brown

Green

Indigo

Jade

Orange

  • Orange Blossom – probably a deliberate mis-identification of the Orange Crop pods fitted to 1312 Flight Hercules aircraft, possibly pod-mounted electronic support measures used on the Hercules
  • Orange Cocktail – experimental homing radar weapon from the 1950s
  • Orange Crop Orange Crop – Racal MIR 2 ESM system for Royal Navy Lynx and Royal Navy Sea King helicopters (HAS.5 onwards but not Mk 4 "Junglies", who had the Racal Prophet lightweight RWR fitted to some, or to the Royal Navy SAR) and some Royal Air Force Hercules aircraft
  • Orange Harvest Orange Harvest – S and X band warning receiver fitted to Shackletons
  • Orange Herald Orange Herald – large boosted fission nuclear warhead, tested at Operation Grapple in 1957
  • Orange Nell Orange Nell – short-range surface-to-air missile (SAGW)
  • Orange Pippin Orange Pippin – Ferranti, anti-aircraft, fire-control radar
  • Orange Poodle Orange Poodle – low altitude, OTHR (Over-the-Horizon) early-warning radar – abandoned
  • Orange Putter Orange Putter – ARI 5800 airborne passive radar warning receiver tuned to Soviet AI radars and fitted to Canberra and Valiant
  • Orange Reaper Orange Reaper – Racal "Kestrel" ESM system for Royal Navy Merlin helicopters
  • Orange Tartan Orange Tartan – 'Auto-Astro' automated star navigation system (day) – see also Blue Sapphire (night)
  • Orange Toffee – radar for Blue Envoy
  • Orange William Orange William – heavy anti-tank missile, canceled, later replaced by Swingfire
  • Orange Yeoman Orange Yeoman – early warning radar and guidance for Bristol Bloodhound SAGW – a.k.a. AMES Type 82

Pink

  • Pink Hawk Pink Hawk – early name for Fairey Fireflash missile. As this was a "watered down" version of the Red Hawk, and thus pink, it is an example of Rainbow Codes having some implied meaning, rather than their usual purely deliberately meaningless choice.

Purple

Red

  • Red Achilles – flamethrower kit for the CT 25 armoured carrier
  • Red Angel Red Angel – air-launched anti-ship weapon or "special bomb"
  • Red Bacchus – mobile mixing plant for Red Vulcan flamethrower fuel
  • Red Beard Red Beard – nuclear weapon
  • Red Biddy – infantry platoon anti-tank missile, cancelled 1953
  • Red Brick – experimental continuous-wave target illuminating radar
  • Red Cabbage – naval radar
  • Red Carpet – X-band radar jammer
  • Red Cat Red Cat – air-launched nuclear stand-off missile cancelled 11/54.
  • Red Cheeks Red Cheeks – inertially guided bomb based on the work of Tubby Vielle
  • Red Cyclops – flamethrower kit for the FV201 tank
  • Red Dean Red Dean – large air-to-air missile
  • Red Devil – experimental blind bombing system using Green Satin and Red Setter radars together
  • Red Drover Red Drover – airborne radar – see Avro 730
  • Red Duster Red Duster – Bristol Bloodhound surface-to-air missile
  • Red Elsie – AP No. 8 anti-personnel mine, developed jointly with Canada.
  • Red Eye (Redeye) – An American general-purpose infra-red homing missile
  • Red Flag Red Flag – free-fall nuclear bomb – 'Improved Kiloton Bomb' – WE.177
  • Red Flannel Red Flannel – experimental Q band H2S
  • Red Garter – Cossor ARI 5818 airborne tail warning radar for the Vulcan, did not enter service
  • Red Hawk Red Hawk – large air-to-air missile "downrated" to give Pink Hawk which became Blue Sky
  • Red HeathenRed Heathen – early SAM project, became Red Shoes and Red Duster
  • Red Hebe Red Hebe – air-to-air missile, a replacement for Red Dean
  • Red Hermes – FV3702 armoured fuel trailer for flamethrower tanks
  • Red Indian – analogue anti-aircraft fire control computer for Bofors L/70 gun.
  • Red King Red King – two-barrel revolver cannon, developed alongside Red Queen. The name is likely not random, but instead a reference to its Oerlikon factory designation, RK, for Revolver Kanone.
  • Red Light Red Light – X band jammer for V Bombers, entered service as ARI 18146
  • Red Neck Red Neck – airborne side-looking radar (SLAR), tested on the Victor, a 40 foot long aerial under each wing. Flexing in flight corrupted the resolution. Cancelled 1962.
  • Red Planet – infantry platoon anti-tank missile
  • Red Queen Red Queen – rapid fire 42 mm revolver cannon anti-aircraft gun
  • Red RapierRed Rapier, Blue Rapier missiles – see UB.109T
  • Red Rose Red Rose – short-range, battlefield nuclear missile for the British ArmyEnglish Electric – later known as Blue Water; cancelled 1962
  • Red Sea (AA) Red Sea – the AA predictor designed for use with the Green Mace automatic AA gun
  • Red Setter Red Setter – experimental side-looking radar for V bombers
  • Red Shoes Red Shoes – see English Electric Thunderbird
  • Red Shrimp Red Shrimp – ARI 18076 airborne high-band jammer fitted to Victor and Vulcan
  • Red Snow Red Snow – nuclear weapon physics package – fitted to Yellow Sun Mk2 and Blue Steel
  • Red Steer Red Steer – EKCO ARI 5919/ARI 5952 airborne tail warning radar – development of AI 20 Green Willow – fitted to Victor and Vulcan. The name likely refers to Jerry Steer at the RRE
  • Red Ticket Red Ticket – associated with AI 17 radar
  • Red Top Red Top – air-to-air missile developed from the Firestreak Mk 4
  • Red Tulip Red Tulip – phase coherent radar Moving Target Indicator (MTI)
  • Red Vulcan – flamethrower fuel mixture

Violet

Yellow

Non-Rainbow codes

Several British military-related terms have a similar "colour" format to Rainbow Codes, but are not true examples since they do not refer to classified research projects and/or were adopted long after Rainbow Codes went out of use. Others are entirely unofficial (sometimes humorous) nicknames. These include:

  • Black Banana – unofficial nickname for the Blackburn Buccaneer. The name "ARNA" (allegedly an acronym for "A Royal Navy Aircraft") was submitted to a Blackburn in-house naming competition. It was only when "Blackburn ARNA" was said out loud that the joke became clear. The initial service aircraft were painted Anti-flash white and were thus nicknamed "Peeled Nanas".{{Cite book |title=Modern Combat Aircraft 7 - Buccaneer |last=Allward |first=Maurice |publisher=Ian Allan |year=1982 |isbn=0-7110-1076-5 |page=52
  • Black Beacon – The Orfordness Rotating Wireless Beacon, known simply as the Orfordness Beacon or sometimes the Black Beacon, was an early radio navigation system
  • 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 anti-aircraft gun control radar used by Argentine forces during the Falklands War. Installed in the Harrier GR.3's starboard 30mm gun pod.{{cite web |title=Falklands 25 |website=Fast Air Photography |url=http://www.fast-air.co.uk/falklands-25/ |title=Hostile Skies |last=Morgan |first=David |publisher=Hachette |year=2012 |isbn=978-1780225005 |page=165
  • Blue Yeoman – unofficial name for an experimental radar made from components of the Blue Riband and Orange Yeoman
  • Green Goddess Green Goddess – colloquial name for Civil Defence fire pump
  • Green Meat – a 'spoof' SAM programme reported in the 1976 RAF Yearbook
  • Green Parrot – unconfirmed low yield nuclear weapon mentioned in a 1981 New Statesman article by Duncan Campbell who later claimed that it was "probably" a copy of the US B57 nuclear bomb. 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 Green Porridge – RAF aircrew nickname for green-tinted H2S bombing radar display PPI image in Valiant, Victor & Vulcan
  • Red Arrows Red Arrows – RAF display team
  • Red Devils 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 Violet Fire – Ultraviolet light fire detection system for Concorde engine bays.{{Cite journal |title=Concorde Power Plant Fire Protection System |journal=Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology |last=Davis |first=R.A. |year=1993 |volume=43 |issue=5 |pages=26–30 |doi=10.1108/eb034768

In popular culture

An allusion to the Rainbow codes was made in the title of the 1961 Alistair MacLean Cold War novel The Dark Crusader, even more so in the American edition's title The Black Shrike. Both names were based on Blue Streak (which was mentioned in the novel); the title was of a fictional solid-fueled ICBM which was the object of a covert theft operation at an isolated Fijian test site.

References

;Notes ;Bibliography

References

  1. Jones, R.. (1978). "Most Secret War". Hamish Hamilton.
  2. Houghton, Vince. (2019). "Nuking the Moon". Penguin.
  3. Guppy, Jonathan. (2008). "Fallout". Lulu.com.
  4. "Blueboar".
  5. "Aviation Book Review".
  6. "Vulcan's Hammer".
  7. PRO. AVIA 65/1193 E10A. Tech Note GW375 p.2
  8. "Greencheese".
  9. Cullen, Tony & Foss, Christopher F. (1991) ''Jane’s Land-Based Air Defence 1990–91''. London: Jane's Information Group. {{ISBN. 0-7106-0915-9
  10. "Green Mace Anti-Aircraft Gun".
  11. ''British Secret Projects: Jet Bombers Since 1949'' Tony Buttler Midland Publishing 2003
  12. "Archived copy".
  13. (1959-09-25). "1959 | 2460 | Flight Archive".
  14. Roger R. Brooks (2007), ''The Handley Page Victor'', Pen & Sword, {{ISBN. 978 1 84415 411 1 p.197
  15. Williams, Anthony G.. (13 May 2011). "The Red Queen and the Vigilante".
  16. "Red Queen Anti-Aircraft Gun".
  17. Jobson P. (2008) ''Royal Artillery Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations'', The History Press, Stroud: 316 pp.
  18. (1976). "Royal Air Force Yearbook 1976".
  19. Campbell, Duncan. (17 April 1981). "The Wings of the Green Parrot". New Statesman.
  20. Duncan Campbell. (1986). "The Unsinkable Aircraft Carrier: American Military Power in Britain". Paladin Grafton Books.
  21. Webster, Jack. (1991). "Alistair MacLean: A Life". Chapmans.

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