Almost 90,000 military style WL motorcycles were made for the armed forces during the war and this model was the biggest selling by far. The bikes were combined with Flathead engines and other features such as the new 'springer' forks from the 1936 EL Knucklehead. The WLA was fitted with a sub-machine-gun holster and was also used by the Soviet Union's Red Army - often with a specially designed sidecar.