Which Was Better?

The American Jeep (Top) and the German Kübelwagen (Bottom)
Which was the better vehicle?

When I was a kid, one of the neighborhood dads had a Jeep, an old Willys as I recall. Not one of your modern SUVs, nope, this little vehicle looked just like it's WWII daddy and may have actually been one. We never sat around discussing it, we'd rather go riding in it. From time to time Donnie and Pete's Dad (the aforementioned neighborhood dad) would oblige us and take four or five of us (we were pretty small back then) up the old trail into the woods behind our street.

No doubt these days some prog would have a conniption at the thought of this adult driving a bunch of us lads through the woods in a vehicle with: no doors, no top, and (Heaven forbid) no seatbelts! Well, as Donnie and Pete's Dad was most assuredly not an idiot (he may have been a veteran if I recall, most dads were back then) our parents had no problem with us riding a Jeep up the hillside and into the forest. (Well, to be honest there was an old trail up into the woods which we kids called, of course, the "old Jeep trail.")

I always loved bouncing around in that little car, right there in the woods, ducking branches, and all of us hollering like a bunch of, well, kids. Go figure.

When I got older I was a proud Volkswagen owner, back when they were simple, cheap, and you didn't need to be a genius to work on them. With the right manual and just simple tools you could fix just about anything on the old Beetle (known as the der Käfer, auf Deutsch). It was also economical to operate, getting around 25 miles per gallon, back when a gallon of gas was around thirty cents, and was very good in snow, being light and having the engine over the drive wheels. Air cooled she was and I don't ever recall either of the "Bugs" I owned ever overheating.

Later on (1973) Volkswagen offered a vehicle they called the Thing, more properly the Type 181...

Volkswagen Thing
(Source)

Notice the similarity to the Kübelwagen? In fact, from what I understand, Volkswagen originally manufactured the Type 181 for use by the Bundewehr, i.e. the post-war West German Army. Now as the old '68 Beetle was starting to get rather rusty (she wasn't in the best of shape body-wise when I bought her but I got a good deal and she ran like a top) I was in the market for a new vehicle.

Naturally, me being me, I hungered for a Type 181. However, the lady I was dating at the time (way previous to The Missus Herself) let me know that if I was so gauche as to actually buy one of those "Things," as she put it (with dripping sarcasm) then she would not be riding in it. Not being completely stupid, I realized that I wasn't ready to go hunting for a new girlfriend and, in point of fact, I could get a really nice brand new Super Beetle which would probably be more "socially acceptable" to my lady friend.

So I did. Loved my 1974 Super Beetle, my kid brother The Musician took care of it for me  (which meant he drove it and changed the oil when needed) when I was overseas. I drove it from Vermont to Colorado (with a very pregnant wife and a very young Naviguesser on board) for a four day trip which the love of my life could not quite get her head around at the time, Korea being a rather small country in comparison. (This being her second trip to the U.S. and the first time she had left Vermont, she wasn't really sure of the sheer size of this country compared to where she hails from.)

When we were not far from Erie, Pennsylvania, she asked -

"How much longer to Denver?"

"Three days."

"Three hours?"

"No love, three days. We have another fifteen hundred miles to go."

Dead silence, an incredulous look, and a loud sigh later, we came within hailing distance of a motel. I decided to stop for the night, letting the magnitude of our journey sink in with The Missus Herself. She argued that we should have flown, I pointed out the need to purchase a new vehicle when we got to Denver. She was of mixed feelings on the topic.

The old Beetle stayed in Denver when we left, I sold it to one of my airmen. Gave him a good deal on the car and let him pay it off over time. He wondered what would happen with me in Fort Collins and him in Denver should he decide not to pay the balance. I pointed out that that would be a pretty bad idea as Leavenworth was full of people who believed in doing stupid things.

"You're right Sarge, I'd be an idiot not to pay you."

I just smiled.

Anyhoo, none of this is addressing the title of the post. Which was the better vehicle? The Jeep or the Kübelwagen? First here's a bit of background from the Pedia of Wiki (minus all of the claptrap about what Kübelwagen means).

The Jeep

The Willys MB and the Ford GPW, both formally called the U.S. Army "Truck, ​1⁄4 ton, 4×4, Command Reconnaissance", commonly known as Jeep or jeep, and sometimes referred to as G503 are off-road capable, light, military utility vehicles that were manufactured during World War II (from 1941 to 1945) for the Allied forces.

The jeep became the primary light wheeled transport vehicle of the United States Military and its Allies in World War II, as well as the postwar period, with President Eisenhower once calling it, "one of three decisive weapons the U.S. had during WWII." It was also the world's first mass-produced four-wheel drive car, manufactured in six-figure numbers. About 640,000 units were built, constituting a quarter of the total U.S. non-combat motor vehicles produced during the war, and almost two-thirds of the 988,000 light vehicle class produced, together with the Dodge WC series, outnumbering those by almost two to one. Large numbers of jeeps were provided to the U.S.' allies, including Russia at the time – aside from large amounts of 1½- and 2½-ton trucks, some 80,000 jeeps were provided to Russia during WW II — more than Nazi Germany's total war production of their jeep counterparts, the Volkswagens Kübelwagen and Schwimmwagen, combined. (Source)

The Kübelwagen

The Volkswagen Kübelwagen was a light military vehicle designed by Ferdinand Porsche and built by Volkswagen during World War II for use by the German military (both Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS). Based heavily on the Volkswagen Beetle, it was prototyped as the Type 62, but eventually became known internally as the Type 82. 

...

With its rolling chassis and mechanics built at Stadt des KdF-Wagens (renamed Wolfsburg after 1945), and its body built by US-owned firm Ambi Budd Presswerke in Berlin, the Kübelwagen was for the Germans what the Jeep and GAZ-67 were for the Allies. (Source)

I'm anticipating Beans mentioning the "finickyness" of German designed vehicles as opposed to the robust, simplicity of Detroit's automotive offerings back in the day, but I  call your attention to my note above regarding the reliability and simplicity of operating and maintaining the Beetle, from which the Kübelwagen was derived. But not having had the chance to drive either the Willys or the Kübelwagen themselves, I found a video from some "experts." They did a "drive off" between the two vehicles, let's see what they said, then you can judge for yourselves. (Oh yeah, these chaps are very British.)

Truth be told, I wish I had one of each!