Toyota, Nissan, Honda gamble on big cars. Or are they?

MSNBC reports that Toyota, Honda and Nissan are, from the 2008 through 2011 model years, plan to expand their U.S. product lines with new brands and models that will be more powerful and bigger than ever. Note that this particular bandwagon has not been too kind to American automakers, so what makes the Big Three automakers of Japan think it will be favorable to them?

It's not as though they haven't been making their cars larger. The Honda Civic, for example, has been growing some 30-inches between 1978 and 2008. Meanwhile, the Honda Accord (pictured) has grown too by 32-inches over the same period of time. We may be remembering the smallest version which came in at 162-inches. Now it is 194.1-inches which, believe it or not, is the length of the Ford Crown Victoria and Buick Lucerne!

It's not the SUVs and pickups that the Japanese companies will be bringing forward. These cars will be sporty, high performance models with horsepower! The Nissan GT-R with 450 horsepower and the LF-1 sports car. The Honda Accord has already been mentioned. In the case of Toyota, okay, maybe it wants to go more into SUVs. Expect to see a larger Toyota Sequoia.

Our take? Is this smart or a witticism? Are they right or are they wrong? Is it worth the gamble? Going on past history for the Japanese Three, they seem to know what they are doing. After all, the world carmakers are now following their lead. then, again, we guess the domestic carmakers -- Chrysler, Ford and General Motors -- are not going to warn the Japanese if they are making a mistake. No doubt, they would like the Japanese to take a fall, at least a little one.