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Originally Posted by AMGoff  Oh no no no... you don't want to play this game with me. Chrysler had been consistently profitable since the 80's when they had paid their loans back seven years ahead of schedule. Regardless of what you may think the K-cars and the minivans were wildly successful and were the key to their turn around in the 80s. It was those profits of the 80's which helped finance a string of successes in the 90's - the LH cars, the JX "could" cars, the Neon, the Ram, the Wrangler, the Grand Cherokee, etc... Before the "merger" they were one of the most profitable, per car manufacturers in the world, their quality and dependability were up (much more so than Mercedes and other Euro makes), Chrysler Financial was raking in money and they had 8-12 Billion in the bank. Do you honestly think Diamler would have leeched onto a failing company, Chrysler was in a stronger position in just about every area compared to Mercedes. In fact it was the 300M which was the linchpin for the deal, being such large, good handling, potent, well built, mass production car made Chrysler all the more attractive to Mercedes. It was supposed to be a "merger of equals," which we know was a crock... and the rest is history.
Bob Eaton screwed to pooch royally when we went forward with the deal. If you want to go even deeper I partially blame Iacocca for picking Eaton over Lutz, Lutz would have nixed the whole deal from the very beginning.
The point of all of this is that you are talking out your ass. I can already tell you're going to be one of those people who likes to contradict anything anyone says. Others may be fine with it but if you're gonna play the Chrysler game you better do your homework first. The fact remains that Chrysler would have been in a much stronger position right now if it weren't for Diamler, hell they could have started losing money on every vehicle sold and still have turned a profit with Chrysler Financial alone.
If this all isn't enough I can gladly pen part 2 about how exactly Mercedes went about screwing Chrysler, but hopefully we get my point. |
Youre telling me that Daimler's entire financial decision to purchase Chrysler was based around the rework of a rework LH platform 300M? It was a decent enough car, but...Give me a break.
Funny you should mention homework... I did my homework on the subject of Chrysler's many mishaps LONG ago, in fact it was a school
project. Rather than argue your stodgy position with me, read the book "COMEBACK" by Paul Ingrassia (among others). It details with GREAT substance, all of the mis-steps chrysler made in the 80s and well into the early 90s. And that was *before* MB bought them out. The LH car, Neon and Ram era of the mid 90s was nothing more than a temporary bandage on a serious underlying problem. And what ended up happening? Exactly what was expected, a revamped product line, HEAVILY praised by the motoring press at the time (I read most every article ever published on the Cirrus/Breeze/Stratus triplets), was allowed to languish and become again nothing but a few platforms reworked to death to produce mediocre vehicles. Combine that with the Dodge Truck division's mounting transmission problems, several thousand paint lawsuits during the 90s over Chrysler's piss poor handling of basecoat and primer applications, and the financial stresses the company was already dealing with from Iacocca's reign... Well, I can continue.
In the end, Chrysler only has itself to blame for selling out to MB. Mopar-heads love to paint a picture of the German Luftwaffe swooping down upon Chrysler headquarters and demanding a merger.
Oddly enough, Chrysler is once again in a unique position to prove it's worth to the rest of the auto industry again... *If* the new leadership can "turn the ship around" so to speak. The golden age for Chrysler was the 60s and 70s, some might even throw some of their 50s creations in there... but after that it just became a joke.