Once again it looks like Ben has tried to answer the Joyce cheer leaders who are claiming Singapore Airlines Scoot airline vindicates the Asianisation of Qantas.
Scoot, Singapore Airlines, Qantas, and its Asia ambitions | Plane Talking
Here are some quotes now that I've worked out how to do them
It is not very bright for analysts to push the line that the revelation of a custard colored paint job for the Singapore Airlines low cost longer range brand Scoot is a vindication of the Qantas infatuation with Asia.
That’s a bit like saying ‘Duh, Asia is full of people who are getting richer so we need to be there.’
Simple minded arguments about how everything is cheaper in China and thus we should all shut down international trade and retreat into some sort of jingoistic village economy with zero population growth, and apply punitive protection tariffs to make Australia strong (somehow) is a throw back to the Black Jack McEwen era in sophisticated trade policy (look him up) which was in vogue shortly before Menzies made the candles flicker in the RSL clubs by talking up the need to sell stuff to the Japanese.
The real issue concerning Qantas and its Asia strategies is not the obvious merits of trying to unlock opportunities in a huge and expanding market but its real intention, which is to break organized labor, dump what bean counters see as the excessive costs of excellence in Qantas flight standards, and retreat from a Qantas international business that has been primarily compromised by management incompetence.
If this management of Qantas can’t apply itself to glaring deficiencies in its fleet, network and product decisions what hope does it have in setting itself up in Asia to muscle in on the premium quality intra-Asia turf of Singapore Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Asiana, Korean Airlines and others?
There's a lot more in there too. I was pretty disappointed with the rest of the media reports on this, including Business Spectator, which for a while was looking like it has finally worked out what was really going on.