Led by Gail Halvorsen, the United States Air Force began Operation "Little Vittles", delivering candy to children as part of the Berlin Airlift.

Colonel Gail Seymour Halvorsen was a senior officer and command pilot in the United States Air Force. He rose to fame for dropping candy to German children during the Berlin Airlift from 1948 to 1949, for which he was nicknamed "Berlin Candy Bomber" or "Uncle Wiggly Wings".

The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its origins to 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal Corps, the USAF was established by transfer of personnel from the Army Air Forces with the enactment of the National Security Act of 1947. It is the second youngest branch of the United States Armed Forces and the fourth in order of precedence. The United States Air Force articulates its core missions as air supremacy, global integrated intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, rapid global mobility, global strike, and command and control.

The Berlin Blockade was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. During the multinational occupation of post–World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway, road, and canal access to the sectors of Berlin under Western control. The Soviets offered to drop the blockade if the Western Allies withdrew the newly introduced Deutsche Mark from West Berlin.