CJ;
...especially since it needs an awful amount of "reading between the lines".
Having seen this kind of report before, I think that this kind of writing is well within what is usually done.
If I may comment generally...- a '
reading between the lines' here isn't intended to diffuse or obscure meaning, (I know you know this...I'm writing generally).
Rather, the Report is expressed in terms that clearly indicate that it is not intended to be specifically linked with any accident. This team did not do a "safety audit" and left large areas of AF unexamined. A safety audit is quite a different thing than an operational safety review.
I think the report accomplishes what it sets out to do, which is to honestly, bluntly, examine areas that work and areas that need change, some "quickly". To me the report's language only appears "soft" - it most certainly isn't but it does not "criticize" either. It is substantively "frank".
The group is a blue-ribbon panel of experts on flight safety processes and I trust their work in this Report. This is a courageous piece of work on the part of Air France when it didn't have to be done. I am completely familiar with many of the organizational issues which the report discusses including "siloing" of departments, lack of respect for others' capabilities, complexity of processes, inability to effectively assess, highlight, communicate and use safety and risk information gathered through programs such as FDM, and so on.
These issues are not unique to Air France and the caution from the authors not to link the report with any one accident is wise and appropriate.
In fact, connecting parts of the Report or linking the Report to one accident would be the same as linking, say, one runway or a specific route, to an accident and concluding that, "we shouldn't use that runway, or fly that route anymore". The Report is far broader than this.
Edited to add:
Corporate culture takes almost a generation to change, unless done with a heavy hand informed by an unusual ability to comprehend the issues and go beyond mere commercial priorities. I know about the issues between management and union having lived with them for 35 years and won't comment further in public except to say that only one can lead and that "soft" responses to safety matters do no one any favours in the long run, but getting there can be extremely difficult depending upon the cultural milieu in which the organization functions. It is easier in Singapore to get something done "quickly" than it is, say, in France, Canada, Italy or even the US, but what is given up in the exchange?