MB offers several different CDI engines in the European C-Class; I'd love to see any of them over here. Mercedes Enthusiast (Brit magazine) did a comparison last spring between a C-Class gasser and one of the diesels (I forget which one, but smaller than the 270). It had 143 hp and torque in the mid to low 200's - fairly similar to the numbers on the engine VW will offer here in the Passat. With an automatic it did 0-60 in the 9 second range, iirc.