Nigger was a male black labrador retriever belonging to Wing Commander Guy Gibson of the Royal Air Force, and the mascot of No. 617 Squadron.

A black explosive sniffer dog named Nigger served with a Royal Engineers mine clearance unit in 1944 during the Normandy Campaign.

[citation needed] Nigger was portrayed in the 1955 British war film The Dam Busters, in which he was mentioned by name frequently.

ITV blamed regional broadcaster London Weekend Television, which in turn alleged that a junior staff member had been responsible for the unauthorised cuts.

When ITV again showed a censored version in June 2001, it was criticised by Index on Censorship as "unnecessary and ridiculous" and because the edits introduced continuity errors.

More recently, in 2012, ITV3 showed the film uncut a few times, but with a warning at the start that it contains racial terms from the period which some people may find offensive.

On Thursday 17 May 2018 an uncut version was shown on the UK channel Film4 with a warning explaining the film was historical and that some would find it to be racially offensive.

Sarah Street notes that the film, while full of emotion, does not articulate it except through secondary devices such as the affection that the characters are shown giving to Nigger.

[10] Christine Geraghty, a lecturer in media studies, observed that "Gibson's suppression of feelings is presented as appropriate rather than problematic, and the use of the dog as his most explicit emotional attachment is in keeping with the way in which class and masculinity are brought together in this isolated but self-sufficient figure.

"[11][12] James Chapman, lecturer at the Open University, adds to that the observation that the scene where Gibson is shown choking back his grief at the death of Nigger, silent and blinking awkwardly, is an example of the stiff upper lip behaviour characteristic of British war films of the genre.

He found that the three characters connected with the raid that most people had heard of were Guy Gibson, Barnes Wallis, and Nigger.