There is not much that can touch a Land Rover on its home turf. The Willys has agility, but no LSD and very limited load capacity. The Champ was excellent but had poor side-slope stability and a non-squaddy-proof back axle. All current US 4*4s are just too big. There was a seriously ugly French thing with a monoblock construction and the 2.1 Peugeot diesel that was usable, but it suffered from poor articulation.

If you want to know about unreliable, try a Mahindra - conceptually fine but badly assembled and very rust-prone.

If you want something you can fix in the middle of a desert or forest with a basic toolkit that will then go on and save your life - Land Rover.

Some of the Jap stuff has merits - if you want to carry an oscilloscope in your repair kit! The early Toyota that never came to the UK (what was it, LJ40 or something) was the best of them - a number still surviving in Africa and the Oz outback.