Late 2012 was a rough time for the European arms of General Motors and Ford. In September of that year, the U.S. investment bank Morgan Stanley diagnosed GM with a case of financial gangrene and recommended the immediate amputation of chronic money loser Opel. The following month Ford announced the most radical production footprint restructuring by an automaker during Europe’s long recession: it would close assembly plants in Belgium and the UK, as well as shut down a stamping plant in Britain.