From Airliners Net Forum:
LadeVale wrote
This confirms it. The Star Alliance needs psychiatric treatment. They have become completely delusional. What will their next proposal be to bring the DOT into their alliance so that all their alliance agreements will be fast-tracked?
BA has a 25% ownership stake in QF and a seat on the QF board. But, somehow the megalomaniacs over at Star think this shouldn't be an obstacle.
QF currently benefits from having an alliance partner in the US (AA) who does not fly itself to Australia. Of course, it only stands to reason, he says sarcastically, that they would jettison AA for UA. Not only would they be helping a direct competitor (UA) better compete against it, but they would probably have to jettison routes and potentially slots to get regulatory approval. AA, Delta and Northwest would scream bloody murder. If you thought the DOT almost gutted BA when it wanted anti-trust immunity for AA/BA, then, you've seen nothing yet. Either UA or QF could be stripped of a significant number of their routes and slots to and from Australia. Like BA, QF benefits handsomely from its routes to the US. Yet, the Star Alliance somehow thinks that QF would forego its own interests to join them. QF is no Thai Airlines.
When one also factors into the equation the operational integration that BA and QF have achieved at the Singapore Hub, one can't help but laugh at the possibility that this was actually discussed at the Star Alliance meeting. I am beginning to think that the CEO of Singapore Airlines bought his doctorate from some diploma mill. Alas, management of the Star Alliance must be as "stupid" as the management of United Airlines. That is the only thing that explains such a ridiculous proposal.