Blue Water ( missile ) Blue Water was a British battlefield nuclear missile of the early 1960s . Despite its good performance and receiving wide praise , it was cancelled for financial reasons . " Blue Water " was a Rainbow Code name . Origins . The missile was developed by English Electric in the late 1950s , in response to a 1958 Operational Requirement for a " short - range corps support weapon " . In 1956 the Corporal missile had been adopted by the Royal Artillery as a battlefield tactical nuclear missile . This missile was liquid - fuelled , thus requiring a large convoy of support vehicles to prepare it slowly for launch . It also required continual command guidance in flight , yet only achieved relatively poor accuracy . Also in use within the Royal Artillery was the Honest John rocket . This was solid - fuelled and could be launched rapidly , but was unguided and had only short range . There was a clear requirement for a missile that would combine guidance and long range with rapid deployment and easy operation . The 1958 requirement was for a solid - fuelled missile with autonomous guidance and requiring only simple support equipment for launch . It also took advantage of the shrinking dimensions and weight of nuclear warheads and so only required a much smaller payload . It was also a requirement that the system should be air - portable through the RAF ' s standard Argosy transport aircraft . As English Electric ' s Guided Weapons Division in Stevenage had been the " foster - parent " for the UK deployment of the Corporal , they were a natural choice to manage the development of its replacement . Development . Developed in the late 1950s , Blue Water was envisaged as a surface - to - surface missile to be used against ground troops : a battlefield nuclear weapon . Developed by English Electric , it was first flown in 1960 and cancelled in 1962 having successfully completed several test flights / trials at both Aberporth and then full - range trials at Woomera . This missile was in length and weighed - in at . The fuselage was cylindrical with a tapered nose , without the swelling required for previous large diameter nuclear warheads . The control surfaces were small and of typical English Electric form : four rear fins and four daggerboard shaped all - moving control surfaces at mid - length , indexed at 45° to the tail fins . Guidance was inertial and once aligned before launch , entirely autonomous in flight . Originally called ' Red Rose ' , the missile was intended to provide a mobile short range nuclear capability for the British Army . It had a range of around . It was to be fitted with a 10 kiloton nuclear warhead under development at Atomic Weapons Establishment ( AWRE ) . Codenamed ‘ Tony ’ , this was a UK version of the US W44 Tsetse primary . The modified Cuckoo solid rocket motor was designed by the Propellant and Explosives Research and Manufacturing Establishment ( PERME ) and made by Bristol Siddeley Engines Ltd . It gave a thrust of . Air - launched stand - off variant . Blue Water has also been described , barely credibly , to be used in RAF service on the TSR - 2 strike aircraft in the stand - off attack role . Additional info 26062013 ; - This writer worked in the Blue Water airframes DO at EE Stevenage From March to December 1960 ; During that time I produced Drawings showing Blue Water carried under the fuselage of TSR2 . This proposed use has little to support it . Most obviously , Blue Water had already been cancelled for two years before TSR - 2 flew . The projected missile is also so different to the actual missile that there would have been little in common between the two . In particular the guidance system assumed a largely ballistic trajectory from a known , static launch point , rather than from a supersonic attack aircraft . The propulsion motor , as developed , also incorporated a phase of increased boost thrust at launch that was inappropriate for an air - launched missile , although the development process would no doubt have deleted that boost . The air - launched range would have been greater than the ground - launched range , probably comparable to the Boeing SRAM , but still relatively short . The RAF was operating a very large , unwieldy , 120 nautical miles range stand - off missile in the high - altitude strategic bombing role , Blue Steel , from the Vulcan and Victor fleets , and some of these were adapted for low - level launch to protect the bombers from increasingly effective SAM defences . A Blue Water air - launched variant used by TSR2 was regarded as an interim measure , like low - level launch of Blue Steel , to bridge the gap before the Blue Steel strategic weapon was replaced by the longer ranged UK Skybolt ALBM force . Like Blue Water , Skybolt also flew a largely ballistic trajectory from a known launch point derived from star sighting / position fixing . Operation . The transporter erector launcher was a modified Bedford RL lorry . Additional launch equipment consisted of an early electronic computer , carried in a Land Rover , together with an alignment theodolite . Missiles were normally to be held under cover until a few minutes before launch , whereupon they would be moved to their launch position and the stabilising jacks beneath the lorry placed in position . These launch positions had been surveyed immediately beforehand , so as to be aligned directly at the target . Prior to launch , the launch computer was connected to the missile by an umbilical cable . The same theodolite was used to align the on - board gyroscopes before launch and the flight plan settings for the missile were downloaded to it . The launch control vehicle could then move on to prepare another launcher within the battery . Only immediately before launch was the missile raised on its launcher and then fired . Each missile required a remarkably small crew of two , not counting the battery survey team , to operate it . Commercial failure and cancellation . Initial hopes for Blue Water had been optimistic , seeing it as a NATO - wide replacement for the clearly obsolete Corporal . The anticipated customer was the West German Bundeswehr , but there were serious expectations that this would become standard equipment across NATO . The US replacement for Corporal was the Sergeant . Solid - fuelled and generally comparable to Blue Water , although it was more complex and slower to operate and , like Corporal , still required a train of semi - trailer vehicles . It was however promised for delivery in 1961 . In 1960 West Germany agreed to buy Sergeant rather than to wait for Blue Water . As this represented the other major customer for Blue Water , and also the likelihood that other potential customers such as Turkey and Italy would then follow this American path , the sales prospects for Blue Water became bleak . The programme was cancelled on 10 August 1962 , as the UK government , whilst still wishing to purchase the missile , was no longer willing to fund the entire development costs itself . The total costs were estimated at around £32 . 1 million . This , and other similar cancellations in this period , were a source of considerable criticism for years to come .