Chosen Instrument?

A mystery was cleared up last week by United Air Lines' president. When all but three of the 19 U.S. airlines joined to advocate competition in postwar international aviation (TIME, July 26), the great unknown was why United Air Lines was among the holdouts. The other two--Pan American Airways and American Export Airlines--were the first U.S. lines to fly foreign routes and naturally would not hanker for too much competition. But United is next to the largest U.S. domestic flyer, has flown international routes only since the Army's Air Transport Command gave it some war business.

By last week United's president, William Allan Patterson, in three consecutive and almost identical statements (in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C.) had made his position clear: United believes in the "chosen instrument" as the best U.S. policy in international aviation.

The Pros. The "chosen instrument" minority believes that if U.S. airlines compete against one another in the international air, they will not have the economic strength to fend off the Government-backed air monopolies of Britain, France, Russia and other nations. For if U.S. competitors duplicate facilities and subdivide the available traffic, their profits will be so small that aggressive competition will either 1) drive them out of business or 2) force them back in the slow death of Government subsidies. Their program, instead, would be to organize a Federally-regulated combination (the "instrument"), in which each interested U.S. line could participate, but which would present a united front to the world in negotiating for franchises, bases, routes, etc.

Said Mr. Patterson last week: "We, by our own conduct, can create chaos which leads us direct to Government monopoly. . . . Let us take one company and get behind it. In that way we can satisfy our individual ambitions and create a strong organization under private enterprise to compete against Government-operated monopolies."

This position coincides with the views of Pan American Airways President Juan Terry Trippe. Juan Trippe, sensitive to political realities, long ago recognized that Pan Am's prewar monopolistic position was unpalatable to many U.S. citizens. The "chosen instrument" policy represents this change in Trippe's thinking. And Pan Am, by sheer force of equipment and know-how, would merit the lion's share of any postwar U.S. combine--at least at the outset.

The Cons. Bill Patterson had scarcely stopped talking when the let's-compete school spoke up again. Speaking before the Pittsburgh Rotary Club, C. Bedell Monro, Pennsylvania Central Airlines' seadrome-enthusiast president (TIME, May 24), lashed out against the "anesthesia of complacent monopoly." He insisted that the reason the U.S. is a top-rank air power is that it had so many domestic lines competing in peacetime. He saw no reason why the same argument should not apply to world flying after the war. And he had no misgivings about the size of the postwar air market.

Said Monro: "It is doubly dangerous and unfortunate that a blind, unreasonable and selfish desire not only to perpetuate but to create an even more gigantic monopoly, is placed ahead of the national welfare. ... It is particularly dangerous when it is based on the filmy, seductive allure of 'one company with all airlines participating.' "

The British. The Trippe school has always pointed to England as the classic example of the nation that found out the hard way that one international airline was enough. (For three years, Britain had only one.) But last week American Aviation reported that 1) "the British Government so far has refused to be smoked out on [the chosen instrument] issue"; 2) British aircraft manufacturers have recently come out four-square for competition. Concluded American Aviation: "There is a growing volume of opinion in England against the Government policy of a monopoly ... in the postwar field."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.