Boeing X20 Dyna Soar

In 1945, millions of German military documents were confiscated by USAAF. One of the concept was the Sanger aerospace bomber. During post-war years, Bell was selected for the study on space-craft, and named BoMi. In 1956, the Air Force channeled Bell's development to a reconnaissance, bombardment vehicle. A competition for a glider prototype was opened. In 1959, Boeing won the competition, and was contracted for the system contractor, Martin as responsibility for the booster airframe. The project designated X-20 Dyna-Soar (Dynamic Soaring). The program was structured in 3-steps. Step-1 was a manned glider that propelled by Titan I or II booster, step-2 was a manned orbital flight and step-3 was a weapon system research. In 1961, plans were changed to develop a vehicle capable of exploring man's military functions in space, that were to adapt the glider to a expensive Titan IIIC booster. Although the mock-up was inspected and accepted, the whole X-20 program was cancelled by Secretary of Defense in 1963, as all funding were transferred to other Air Force similar space program, Gemini and ASSET