An expose+a7 of the auto industry details some of the industry's darker secrets, including the fact that General Motors manufactured airplane engines for Nazi Germany and that the Japanese car industry started with a design theft from the English. Tour.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Even readers with only a passing interest in cars will be drawn into Mantle's unorthodox history of competition and corporate backstabbing among the automotive giants. Most auto buffs assume the Volkswagen "Beetle" was born in 1934 when Hitler commissioned cunning Austrian-Czech engineer Ferdinand Porsche to build a "people's car." Mantle fills in the story, providing details of Porsche's Nazi Party and SS membership (1923-1929) and his employment of slave labor; further, the VW Beetle's unsung progenitor was Austrian engineer Hans Ledwinka, based in Czechoslovakia, who gave Hitler a detailed drawing of a rear-engined car he had designed, which the Fuhrer then passed on to Porsche. In an astonishing section, Mantle details how General Motors's Opel subsidiary, based in Nazi Germany, manufactured Blitz trucks and fighter-jet engines for Hitler's forces. In 1967, GM received $33 million in tax exemptions from the U.S. government for damages sustained by Allied bombing of its German factories. Biographer of Andrew Lloyd Weber and author of a book about Lloyd's of London, Mantle spins tales that revise modern history: Fiat's Cold War balancing act as its ex-playboy-turned-dealmaker Gianni Agnelli clinched a pact to build cars in the Soviet Union in the mid-1960s; Toyota's ascent from near-bankruptcy in 1950 through its revolutionary production methods; Nissan's start-up in 1930 when its engineers plagiarized a British Austin Seven; Detroit's 1980s' slide from Motor City to Murder City; and the battle for global dominance among European, Japanese and U.S. automakers. Packing in tales involving Renault, Peugeot, Mazda, Ford, Hyundai, BMW, Volvo and Land-Rover, Mantle closes this eye-opening chronicle with a look at the massive smuggling of stolen cars into Eastern Europe and China. Photos.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Library Journal
British author Mantle, best known for his celebrity biographies, has more recently been directing his investigative skills toward the world of commerce and industry. He first exposed the ups and downs of that venerable institution in For Whom the Bell Tolls: The Lessons of Lloyd's of London (Sinclair-Stevenson, 1992, dist. Trafalgar Square); now he takes on the international automotive industry. Beginning with the events just prior to World War II, he brings the reader through the following 50-odd years and along the way describes the intrigue and cutthroat antics of this highly profitable but extremely competitive manufacturing industry?the largest in the world. While the book is laced with numerous stories and colorful characters, it never seems to form a coherent whole but rather a collection of tales. Because of this, the reader comes away confused about the many events and personalities discussed. Recommended only for libraries with large holdings in this area.?Robert Logsdon, Indiana State Lib., Indianapolis
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Great potential, but poor follow through,
By robertl@fagmed.uit.no (Venice, CA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Car Wars: Fifty Years of Greed, Treachery, & Skulduggery in the Global ..... (Hardcover)
I heard the author, Jonathon Mantle on a radio show and became quite excited by the prospect of reading his book. It seemed like an accessible yet critical analysis of the car industry from a decidely non-"Car and Driver" enthusiasts point of view. Unfortunately, it turns out the entire book is just a gloss, very short chapters that are almost contentless. I felt cheated. Important subjects are mentioned and then left, some longer chapters are on mundane issues such as industrial sabotage while really important issues such as the collusion of car and chemical industries to destroy public transportation are only briefly noted. The saving grace was a very good apendix and bibliography that should have been used more in the body of the book. I thought the whole thing a very weak effort. If I could I would return the book to Amazon for a refund.
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
A book tainted with racists comments and research errors,
By Carlos Santillan (Mexico City, Mexico.) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Car Wars: Fifty Years of Greed, Treachery, & Skulduggery in the Global ..... (Hardcover)
His historical research is pretty poor when in the page 92 he wrote: "In 1967, President Salinas of Mexico had asked Volskwagenwerk to build the Mexican peoples' car".In 1967, the mexican president was Díaz Ordaz, and Salinas took office until 1988. And in the same page too, when talking about that the Volskwagen succeeded as a masses car in Africa and Latin-America he writes : "...the Beetle had become the vehicle of freedom and mobility for races whom Hitler and Speer would have damned as Untermenschen (subhuman) and consigned to Nacht und Nebel (night and fog = gas chamber)" What's the point of this comment Mr Mantle? Through all the book the author seems to be interested in remarking the Nazi background of Henry Ford, the Ford Co. and GM as a way of celebrating them, it seems.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A Great Potential, Nevertheless a Great Fall,
By
This review is from: Car Wars: Fifty Years of Greed, Treachery, & Skulduggery in the Global ..... (Hardcover)
I liked the book - a lot. But there were too mant questions left unaswered. Frankly, if Mr.Mantle published all the materials as a different book that he would have collected for writing this, that may answer a lot. In short, he cut too much out of a great length of fascinating and valuable information. Please, do write it again, or revise this book fully. I will buy that. For the time being, this book is just a reference of chaos. And a damn good one.
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