Back in 1998, Tom Clancy released his fantastic counter terrorist novel, Rainbow Six. It was a story about an international counter terrorism team where they stop several attacks which we later learn are all linked to a much more dire scheme. The popularity of the book gave birth to a whole series of video games with the first game being released on PC and then ported to MAC OS, N64, Playstation, and Gameboy Color. The cover art is iconic, but did you know the Oakley goggle “Operator” was an H&K employee?

According to Zim EDC Military Hobby on Facebook:

John T. Meyer, Jr., former Vice President of Sales and Training at Heckler & Koch USA posing for a promotional photo in 1992. The photo was used to promote the launch of the HK USP in the American market in 1993. It was later used as the box art for the first Rainbow Six game released on August 21st 1998.

According to John Meyer, they even sent instructors to California for motion capture when the video game was developed. Their movements were used for the characters movements in the game.

photo credit: Crappy games wiki

Who here read Rainbow Six and played its long lived video game series? The book is one of my all time favorites and I did play the first game, however I have not kept up with the series.