During the Battle of France in the summer of 1944, a small grass airstrip north of the town was used for light liaison aircraft by the United States Army Air Forces. The Twelfth Air Force headquartered several fighter wings in Vittel during their drive east into Germany. In 1945, that flat, grassy area of land (now a racetrack for horses) was used as a holding area for captured Luftwaffe aircraft before their shipment to England and the United States for evaluation (Operation Lusty).