Let's get the criticisms out of the way first. Agreed, the rear-engined, air-cooled Beetle is slow, noisy, uncomfortable and hardly the sportiest drive around. It's not even particularly fuel-efficient, it's rather rust-prone and its fragile body would be crushed in an NCAP crash test as surely as its namesake gets crushed underfoot. Arguably, owning a Beetle in Britain today is a bit like having a pet; it's not a real car for practical day-to-day transport.

Beetle owners defend their cars' character, their personality, and I've yet to hear of a Beetle that didn't have an icky name. Owners meet at large-scale rallies to congratulate each other on their non-conformism - en masse. It's all a bit off-putting if you don't buy into the whole Love Bug lifestyle. In the Western world, the Beetle's appeal rests largely on often misguided nostalgia, as the car of choice for hippies, peaceniks, environmentalists and anti-consumerists from the Sixties to the present day. Ironic, that, considering that the Beetle was commissioned by Adolf Hitler - another criticism levelled at it by its detractors, though the idea of a 'car for the people' (literally, 'volks wagen') was by no means confined to dictators.

Still, as anachronisms go - and a car that remained little changed in its 65-year history is one hell of an anachronism - the Beetle is an important one. Let's not forget the models it spawned, for a start - the Type 62/82 jeep ("The Thing", or "Safari"), the amphibious Schwimmwagen, the Variant family-sized cars, the pretty Karmann Ghia coupe and cabriolet, and, of course, the Type 2 Transporter and Microbus camper van. Not to mention a certain 356 and the establishment of Porsche - but then that's another story altogether.

The Beetle has always been more than a twee fashion accessory. This is the car, after all, whose production almost single-handedly kick-started the German economy after World War II (with a little help from a British army major) and got the nation's citizens motorized. And not just the Germans: subsequent production lines including those in Sao Paolo, Brazil, Puebla, Mexico and South Africa did their bit providing affordable transport for millions worldwide.

The Beetle has played a crucial role in global economics, quite apart from making such an impact on individual lives. Its technology might be virtually prehistoric, but its ability to run on the ropiest of fuels, the ease with which it can be patched up and maintained, its capability to cope with rough and unsurfaced roads or inhospitable climates, and its sheer propensity to just keep on running renders it ideal for regions with poor infrastructure and so-called "developing" nations, where it continues to fulfil an inestimably valuable role.

I don't have any personal anecdotes about the Beetle, having never owned one as yet (I could be tempted, as technically, they fascinate me). However, my father wistfully remembers his regular journeys across the desert between Baghdad to Beirut in the Bug he owned in the 1960s. One journey, he collided with a truck near the Syrian border, but was able to continue after a makeshift hammering-out of the damage. My Baghdad-based aunt and uncle bought a (secondhand) Beetle in the late '60s, which kept going through fuel crises, trade embargos, shortages of everything imported and both Gulf Wars with no more than clever improvisation; when cheap Far Eastern imports became available recently they traded up to a Proton with air conditioning, but their Beetle lives on nonetheless.

There have been other 'people's cars' developed with similar ideals and aims: the Ford Model T, Fiats Topolino and Cinquecento, the Citroen 2CV, Renault 4, Morris Minor, Austin Seven and Mini, to name just a few, but none have inspired such widespread affection as the Beetle, nor enjoyed such longevity. Over 21 million Beetle buyers - and all the subsequent owners of these cars - can't all be wrong.