Iranian famine of 1942–1943

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The Iranian famine of 1942–1943 was a period of mass starvation during the Anglo-Soviet occupation of Iran during World War II. Iran had been invaded in August 1941 by the joint forces of the Soviet Union and United Kingdom despite being a neutral country during World War II, resulting in the collapse of Reza Shah's military, political and social order as well as his deposition and exile. The British preferred to restore a Qajar to the throne but begrudgingly accepted the 21 year-old Mohammad Reza Pahlavi after finding no suitable Qajar candidates. Despite this, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi would exercise no real power in Iran until the end of the occupation five years later. In order to transport oil and other supplies to the Soviet Union, the Allies took control of the Trans-Iranian Railway and forcibly contracted half of Iran's publicly and privately owned trucks, thus controlling 75 percent of the country's food distribution capacity within months of the invasion. Compounded by a bad harvest...

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