"Bumf" derives from "bum fodder". It probably derives from the Armed Forces.

The Services had a delightful way with hyperbole. Cutlery is referred to as "eating irons" or "gobbling rods". A spanner is a "nut strangler". The British Army especially has a habit of acquiring Hindi, Malaysian or Arabic words and putting them indirectly into the English language. Examples are: "ulu" (Malay "forest"), "shufti" (Arabic "look").

I don't know how the pacifist and left-wing Ben Elton, Tony Robinson and the other writers and actors of the anti-war "Blackadder goes forth" felt, when catch phrases from that marvellous series were picked up wholesale by the British forces deployed to the Gulf in 1991. Troops were accomodated in "Blackadder Lines" and "Baldric Lines", Iraqi airspace or territory was referred to as "sausage side", and a Nimrod patrol aircraft was named "Nursie". And of course, Operation Desert Sabre was "the cunning plan".

This doesn't seem to have carried over to the Second Gulf War and subsequent occupation.

My favourite services acronym? You've all heard of TEWTs (Tactical Exercises without troops)? The British Army has been known to conduct JEWTS (Jungle Exercises without Trees) and NEWDS (Night Exercises without Dark).