Originally Posted by
fireman0174
From the Washington Post website:
"The US Airways-United Airlines $12.3 billion merger plan collapsed on July 27, 2001, after the Department of Justice said it would sue to stop the deal."
I would consider that the U.S. Government did in fact stop a potential merger.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...air/index.html
In fact (I'm not sure about this), has there ever been a merger allowed between two top six major airlines when both were making money? The only big airline mergers I can think of have occurred when the one being acquired was deep in chapter 11 and about to go out of business (TWA, Pan Am, Eastern, USAir, etc.).
Here is a good review of what congress was thinking and doing just seven short years ago the last time the industry was "healthy" right before 9/11. It wouldn't surprise me to see some of this legislation dusted off and reconsidered.
http://democrats.senate.gov/~dpc/pubs/107-1-143.html