The DC-X, short for Delta Clipper or Delta Clipper Experimental, was an unmanned prototype of a reusable single stage to orbit launch vehicle built by McDonnell Douglas in conjunction with the DOD's SDIO from 1991 to 1993. After that period it was given to NASA, which upgraded the design for improved performance to create the DC-XA. According to Jerry Pournelle: "DC-X was conceived in my living room and sold to National Space Council Chairman Dan Quayle by General Graham, Max Hunter and me." According to Max Hunter, however, he had tried hard to convince Lockheed-Martin of the concept's value for several years before he retired.

Hunter had written a paper in 1985 entitled "The Opportunity", detailing the concept of a Single-Stage-To-Orbit spacecraft built with low-cost "off-the-shelf" commercial parts and currently-available technology, but Lockheed-Martin was not interested enough to fund such a program themselves. On February 15, 1989, Pournelle, Graham and Hunter were able to procure a meeting with Vice-President Dan Quayle. They "sold" the idea of SDIO by noting that any space-based weapons system would need to be serviced by a spacecraft that was far more reliable than the Space Shuttle, and offer lower launch costs and have much better turnaround times.

They argued that such a spacecraft would have to be a single stage to orbit design. Any other design would require the craft to be "re-built" after every launch, a time consuming operation unless the drop-off parts were either very simple or disposable. Using low-cost disposable parts is certainly possible, as is evidenced by the Space Shuttle's external tank, but these impose range safety requirements to ensure the parts don't fall on population centers.

Only an SSTO design avoids all of these problems, albeit at the price of a more-expensive construction and testing phase needed to produce the required low-weight craft.

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