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Myanmar Ensigns

Burma

Naval Ensign
Naval Ensign - reported variants (dubious)
Civil Ensign (dubious)
State Ensign (dubious)
Air Force flag
Air Force Ensign
unidentified flag
Air Force Ensign (dubious variant)
Fin Flash and Aircraft Marking

Naval Ensign

by Zeljko Heimer

White flag with red canton with white star, and blue anchor in lower fly.
Zeljko Heimer, 1 July 2002

I have seen no current evidence of a Myanmar Merchant ensign or a Myanmar state ensign. I spent quite a bit of time on the Ayeyarwaddy, Bago and Yangon rivers last week and was impressed by what I didn't see. There were two Myanmar Five Star Line ships anchored just west of Pansodan Jetty on the Yangon River in Yangon. Both ships were flying the Myanmar national flag as their ensign. One ship flew the Myanmar Five Star Line flag from its jack staff while the other flew the lines flag from its main mast starboard side. I saw several patrol boats and numerous barges and river ferries. The patrol boats flew nothing at all while the barges and river ferries also flew the Myanmar national flag.

The primary Myanmar flag maker I visited had no "supposed" merchant flags or state ensigns in stock, and as best as I could tell, had never seen a sample of either. I never actually saw a naval ensign flying from a ship, but the flag maker had several in stock. I took the attached photo. It measures 36" x 65" which roughly translates to the 5 to 9 proportional standard which applies to all Myanmar flags.

Clay Moss, 17 June 2003

Naval Ensign - reported variants (dubious)

5:9, by Zeljko Heimer, as reported in Album des Pavillons (2000)

White flag with red cross throughout and blue canton with white emblem. Neither Smith (1975), Smith (1982) nor Crampton (1990f) mention this flag; all of them designate the national flag as CSW/CSW. Therefore I speculate that this flag is recently (re-?)adopted. On the other hand, Album des Pavillons (1990) shows a series of other ensigns - civil, state and air - which are never corrected in subsequent corrections, but are now not shown in Album des Pavillons (2000). Therefore I guess that Armand du Payrat got no confirmation of these. Further, no other major vexillological work shows these ensigns, and I propose a theory that they actually never existed. There may have been such ensigns with the former (pre-1974) 1+5 stars flag as reported (actually I have no source on this, but that is only because I lack sources from period between 1939 and 1975). My theory is that after the emblem in canton was changed in 1974 someone supposed that it was done thus in all the flag variants and showed them so in Album des Pavillons (1990).
Zeljko Heimer, 30 June 2002

by Zeljko Heimer

The naval ensign described above has never existed in real life. The real naval ensign, shown on photos on Jane's Fighting Ships, is a horizontal bicolour, sky blue over navy blue, with a white five-pointed star (half the width of the ensign) at the centre of the ensign.
Miles Li, 30 June 2002

Myanmar is a country from which reliable information is very difficult to obtain. Here is my evidence:

the white ensign described in Album des Pavillons (2000) comes from Glen Hodgin's visit in October 1999 to the Myanmar ambassador in Sri-Lanka (a former admiral in Myanmar Navy).
since then, Glen saw in Jane's a photo dated 1993 similar to the one described by Miles but red over blue, and the national flag used as jack.
in Franciae Vexilla, Dec 2000, Jean Renault reported a naval ensign seen in 1999 on a river patrol boat: a white 5-pointed star on a red canton, a blue 5-pointed star on low fly on white field.
Michel Lupant reported in May 2002 a naval ensign (photo taken by him in a naval headquarter), white 5-pointed star on red canton, blue anchor on low fly on white field.

I suppose this latter is the correct naval ensign today. It will be published as such in next oncoming corr 2 to Album des Pavillons.
Armand du Payrat, 1 July 2002

by Zeljko Heimer

A horizontal bicolour, red over navy blue, with a white five-pointed star. Both ensigns above are reported from Jane's Fighting Ships. Is it possible that one report is
wrong, or are there two different photos we are talking about? The second one was accompanied by the national flag as the jack.
Zeljko Heimer, 1 July 2002

by Zeljko Heimer

In Franciae Vexilla #20/66, December 2000, J. Renault reports an ensign he saw on a river patrol boat in Burma. The ensign has a white field with a blue star at lower fly and a red canton charged with a white star. Exact attribution of the ensign is unknown.
Ivan Sache, 19 December 2000

I guess that this flag and the one below might easily be one and the same ensign, but possibly the first misreported the star for the anchor - not an unusual error if the
flag was not at its best visibility.
Zeljko Heimer, 1 July 2002

Civil Ensign (dubious)

by Zeljko Heimer, as reported in Album des Pavillons (1990)

Horizontal bicolour of blue over red with the white emblem as in the national flag in upper stripe at hoist.

Zeljko Heimer, 1 July 2002

State Ensign (dubious)

by Zeljko Heimer, as reported in Album des Pavillons (1990)

Government ships ensign (except warships). Blue ensign with the national flag in canton.

Zeljko Heimer, 1 July 2002

Myanmar Air Force flag

by Rob Raeside

The green Myanmar Air Force flag.
Clay Moss, 2 July 2003

Air Force Ensign

by Ivan Sache

This flag was stocked by a flag manufacturer in Yangon who called it the Myanmar Air Force flag. I looked for this flag in front of the Air force unit at Yangon International Airport, but saw no flags flying at all. The Mig's were certainly interesting to look at though. They are painted in a really interesting blue camouflage. The roundel and fin marking are exactly the same as on the illustration below.
Clay Moss, 18 June 2003

My rendition of the Air Force flag is based on Clay's photograph. It seems to be 5:7 rather than 5:9, unless a part of the flag had remained folded.
Ivan Sache, 18 June 2003

Note on the Myanmar Air Force flag how small the triangle roundel is and where it's located. If the flag was vertically divided into fourths, the roundel would occupy the lower corner of the 4th fly quarter. The roundel is roughly 6 inches tall on the 36 inch wide flag. The white star is 9 inches tall.
Clay Moss, 25 June 2003

Unidentified flag

by Clay Moss

Here's another interesting Myanmar Air Force flag of some sort. I'm not sure what it is, and the manufacturer was not able to explain it to me. The bird emblem in the middle is double sided with the bird facing toward the hoist on the reverse side. I brought home a flag similar to this one except mine has a dark green background and a different bird.
Clay Moss, 18 June 2003

Air Force Ensign (dubious variant)

by Zeljko Heimer, as reported in Album des Pavillons (1990)

Light blue field with national flag in canton and the roundel (blue-white-gold triangle) at the lower fly.

Ivan Sache, 29 January 1998

Fin Flash and Aircraft Marking

Zeljko Heimer

Former Burma was of the exceptional states [with] its fin flash as nothing to do with the national flag. The Tambaw Lay used a square, vertical yellow/gold-white-blue (2:1:2) as its flash. Based on Wheeler (1986).
Dov Gutterman, 8 October 1999

The Burmese (and Myanmar) fin flash is still in use today (since 1955).
Dov Gutterman, 25 March 2000

by Zeljko Heimer

The current aircraft "roundel" consists of three concentric equilateral triangles of blue-white-yellow.
Zeljko Heimer, 30 June 2002