I WOULD SUPPORT DRILLING IN ANWAR IF AND ONLY IF

Toyota Closes In on G.M.
By MICHELINE MAYNARD and JAMES BROOKE

DETROIT, Dec. 20 - After reigning atop the global auto industry since the depths of the Depression in the 1930's, General Motors may finally cede its spot next year to Toyota. The Japanese company's ascendancy underscores the enormous obstacles faced by G.M. on many fronts.

On Tuesday, Toyota announced from its offices in Nagoya, Japan, that it planned to produce 9.06 million cars worldwide in 2006. That would be a 10 percent increase for the company, which has plants on every major continent.

The expected output level - arriving four years ahead of previous projections - means that Toyota and G.M. will be in a tight battle for the crown as the world's biggest carmaker in 2006, a race that will pit the industry's strongest company against its struggling giant. But even if G.M. retains the title next year, the industry already views Toyota as the premier automaker, flush with cash and posting a steady increase in sales in the United States, Europe and parts of Asia during the past decade.

Toyota passed Ford to become the world's second-largest carmaker in 2003.

"G.M. is not the company it used to be, and it's not going to be what it was ever again," said Jeffrey K. Liker, a professor of engineering at the University of Michigan and the author of "The Toyota Way," the best-selling book that examined the Japanese company's management principles.

Reflecting that view, G.M. shares on Tuesday fell to their lowest level since the stock market crash in 1987. They closed at $19.85, down $1.20, on the Toyota estimate and the news that the billionaire investor Kirk Kerkorian had sold 12 million shares of his G.M. stock. This year, G.M. shares have lost 50 percent of their value, the more recent pullbacks coming amid speculation that it may have to seek bankruptcy protection to overhaul its sagging North American operations.