WD Warflat, 50-ton heavy flatcar When the Iran was occupied in August 1941 by British and Soviet forces in order to open a save "back-door" for Lend-Lease deliveries to Russia, the Iranian State Railway car park was in rather poor condition. Of nonpassenger cars, the British found 1,998, divided among 924 boxcars, 457 low-side gondolas, 87 freight cars, 295 tank cars, 170 ballast cars and 65 rail cars. In their first year of the occupation, the Britsh imported 891 additional cars, among them 50 WD Warflats, and 1,990 were shipped in from the US, to bring the total to 4,779 freight cars, still a number considered altogether insufficient to handle the Russia-aid target. A total of 250 Warflats, also available with a payload of 45 tons, were built on 2 MoS orders by Metropolitan-Cammell at Washwood Heath in Birmingham in the years 1940, 1941 and 1942. Note : The Warflat is shown here carrying two Canadian 17-ton »Valentine VI« Infantry tanks, securely fixed by wooden logs and chains and with their turret turned round to six o'clock.