TOM PETZINGER, an aviation reporter with the Wall St Journal, has written an insider's view of the dozen or so men who have shaped the world's airline industry over the past 25 years and their battles for control of the skies.
Aviation is one of the youngest industries of our century; younger than radio, telecommunications, movies or car manufacturing. It used to be accessible only to the few, but within the last two decades more people in America fly than own a car.
Airlines underpin the world's biggest industry - travel and tourism and they are indispensible to global trade and commerce. Yet behind the outward appearances of stability of today's flight line lies 25 years of boardroom dogfights, bankruptcies, strikes, lock-outs, fare wars, firings, mergers and a graveyard of airline names that once blazoned across the skies: Pan Am, People Express, Eastern, Frontier, Braniff and Air Florida.
Much of this book deals with the American theatre in what Petzinger sees as a war of the Titans, dominated by men for whom victory was its own reward. Not that the monetary spoils were small; chairmen and chief executives were traded in millions like today's football stars, and their share options often ran to billions even when they exited a company on the verge of bankruptcy.
Each had his own style, reacting differently to the same set of economic forces. Bob Crandall, the aggressive marketing genius at American Airlines who was known to his staff as Fang, because of two prominent front teeth, used technology to create competitive weapons against all comers.
Donald Burr of People Express tried to woo his staff with promises of love and trust in the workplace; Richard Ferris, at United, told his workers to do things his way or get out. Frank Lorenzo of Texas International, perhaps the greatest of the upstart buccaneers in the wake of deregulation, borrowed enough money to seize control of a flying armada, only to find that he couldn't merge his machines as a single airline, with the result that all went belly up. Herb Kelleher of Southwest Airlines borrowed almost no money, bought as few planes as possible, broke all the marketing rules and is still in business.
The decision of the US Government to deregulate aviation in 1978 has been blamed for much of what subsequently happened, but it was something that would have happened anyway. Protection had fostered safety and the technical development of the industry, especially the advent of the jet age; but by the 1970s it was anachronistic. Allowing airlines to raise fares every time their costs went up would never produce mass travel.
The new freedom, coupled with computerised reservations systems, brought in low cost, no frills airlines flying alongside the major carriers, but offering peanut fares. The traffic explosion led to a rapid response from the big boys. Crandall saw no reason why he could not offer low fares alongside higher fares on the same aircraft. And so today's "supersavers" and the three classes of fares and service, were born passengers could have a choice, if they were prepared to pay for it.
The new computer technology allowed airlines to pinpoint traffic trends and passenger preferences. Traffic mushroomed, but so did costs, and when the airlines tried a two tiered level of salaries and work rules, destructive strikes often led to collapses. Down sizing became the major competitive tool in a business that had just about exhausted every other avenue of growth.
By the Eighties a new generation of fuel efficient wide bodied planes such as the B767 and the Airbus, had replaced the long haul Boeing 747 on domestic and transatlantic routes. Europe had opened up, allowing American carriers to fly direct from US cities to London and other European capitals. Each airline developed a hub airport where it had a virtual monopoly, with feeder traffic coming into a single point, like American in Miami, Delta in Atlanta, US-Air in Pittsburgh, Northwest in Minneapolis, and United in Denver, among others.
Even the British Airways hold on Heathrow Airport in London was broken - but not before Colin Marshall had bought a share of United and US Air, giving BA access to their massive internal markets and making it one of the first new global megacarriers.
But no sooner had he turned around BA to allow it to be privatised (and win him a knighthood) than Sir Colin found he had a monkey on his back in the shape of a young, brash upstart called Richard Branson. He had the temerity to sue Sir Colin and BA for "dirty tricks" - and what's more he won £1 million in compensation (and a note from Princess Di with one word in her handwriting: "hurraaay").
So what of the future? For the present the network airlines and the niche carriers have settled down to their respective markets. Passengers have become much more sophisticated and ready to pay for flexibility and good value. But profit margins remain tight in a business notoriously sensitive to fuel prices and terrorist bombs. Technology is at a standstill, with no sign of a mass travel supersonic aircraft.
Under today's rules the big airlines, both American and European, will continue to consolidate their power through the use of strategems such as sharing seats and airport slots, which allows them to sell globally. But it remains a business where today's partner can suddenly become tomorrow's competitor. I doubt that we have seen the last of the battle for the skies.