The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-03-04
U.S.Must CompeteFor
 Position As Air Power
Worldwide Competition to Follow End of Hostilities
 in Europe, Asia-FOrtune Magazine Gives Picture

New York, March 4--Commercial air power after the war may deter mine the place the United States will hold as a world power in terms of trade Fortune magazine declares today in its. March issue which is devoted entirely to the single subject of American aviation.
 Pointing out that "the battle now being fought to an unknowable con- clusion over Britain and the Medi- terranean is nothing less than a search for new definition of the freedom of the air." the magazine of management asserts that per haps the most significant geo-politi- cal fact of our time Is the over- whelming possibility of the air as 8 new road to world power and trade"
 Difficult to Grasp
 "It is hard for the mind, its processes almost irretrievably com mitted to the past, to grasp the im- plications," Fortune admits. "But developments even now visible technological, economic, strategic foretell a steady undermining of the historical past, and the sher exist ence of the universal ocean of air presents statesmen with a geography in which the shoreline is everywhere and no city on the earth Is more than @ weeks reach from the most distant.
 What does this mean to us? It means that the U. s. must get out upon the international air with the full thrust of It's technological power, trading genius, and resources It means we must become conscious of what the rise of air power means to the future role of the U. s. as a world power, not only in moral and strategic terms, but in terms of trade in terms, finally, of the great mer- chant fleets of the air, the carriers of goods and people, which will come as certainly as the ultimate peace
 "U. s. foreign air policy, until re- gently, was characterized by almost no policy" Fortune points out. And in the absence of any established government program Pan-American Airways corporation was conceived and waxed strong In the general image of the European monoplies, It is the Stars and Stripes on the air trade routes of the world to an extent that no U. s. shipping lane ever was on the sea.
 While monopoly may startle or disturb the average American never theless this is the well-established pattern in international air trans portation operations, as in shipping. Every major country flying out of Europe has come to 1t.
 Era of Competition
 But the rise in 1887 of American Export Airlines, Inc, a subsidiary of American Export Lines, Inc, marks the second and for Pan-American perhaps more dangerous era-the era of competition and government intrusion. The clash with Pan- American was immediate and the struggle between these two operators has widened into Latin America.
 This crawling between two U. s. nationals in Latin America has up- set and embarrassed the state de- partment. For in the background are issues that strike to the heart of the tentatively evolving U. s. air policy.
 "There is the issue of whether it is advisable for one carrier to handle all U. s. transoceanic air traffic." Fortune explains. There is the issue of negotiating landing rights with foreign governments. There is, thirdly, the issue of developing U. s. air policy in Latin America. There is, finally, the issue of arriving at a comprehensive U. s. air policy: shall 1t be monopoly or competi- ton?
 These questions lead directly to the main issue. which is: how much normal air trade is there, and how much is there worth fighting for?
 World air-trafiic statistics are notoFiouEiy unreliable. for routes overlap, passengers are often count cd two or three times. and national istic fevor c0nd0nes tampering with the decimal points. No satisfactory estimate Of a grand total can be inh1s Co include Eufoptfs Tnick- woven internal trafiic and all the far, mysterious movements in the U. 0. 9. R.. Africa and the Eaek.