On the outside, looking in... I'm impressed with WM and Rolf's restraint, even as they support their position.

From my viewpoint, I had never seen an airline side so openly with one group, to isolate them in a subsidiary (Guadalupe), and threaten with their jobs if they didn't take the native-sponsored agreement. Then again, I was amazed that they could get away with it. It tells me that Air Tran must have had some really crappy fragmentation language, that they couldn't force arbitration. There is nothing wrong with turning down deals in favor of arbitration in SLI's, since SLI's are often almost never possible to solve amicably. Nothing wrong, that is, unless you're not in a position to do this.

I think for the rest of the industry, the moral of the story is to have strong contractual language in Section 1. That's a hard one to invest in, but a costly one to learn about in hindsight.

I feel bad for the AirTran guys that the SWAPA guys negotiated the way they did, and colluded with their management, but then again, it's hard to blame them for using the tools they were handed by AirTran's contract. Management was desperate to eliminate the competitor, and favoring the natives was the short-sighted way to do it.

Would another group have acted differently than either of those two groups?

At the end of the day, of course, IHSWA.

Best Regards,

Sink r8.