The hottest car I ever owned was a 1982 Volkswagen Scirocco GTI in metallic dark green. I once drove it overnight from London to Tuscany with a blind date who never spoke to me again, but that’s another story. My point is that VW built my generation’s chariots of fire and some of us feel more sadness than schadenfreude at what the Telegraph calls ‘the downfall of a German giant’, as the flagship of its nation’s industrial armada contends with multiple impacts of geopolitical and technological change. But I’d say the image of VW ‘speeding towards a precipice as the Chinese move in’ is more than a touch overhyped. It’s a narrative of our era that the West collectively must always challenge.

The VW synopsis is this: along with other German carmakers, the group has suffered a shrinkage of lucrative exports to China, while Chinese EV manufacturers have invaded Europe. Donald Trump’s tariffs have whacked US orders and (much less talked about) Putin’s war has wrecked sales to Russia. VW employs far too many workers – 650,000 at last count – in too many factories, while the loss of cheap Russian energy has spiked its operating costs.

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Now there’s talk of halving the model range, cutting 100,000 jobs, closing plants (including the one at Osnabrück that made my Scirocco), possible spin-off of the group’s other marques which include Porsche,........

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