I think that when Moritz Suter was put in charge of the Swissair group and had a look at the balances, he couldn't get out of there fast enough.
A shame that he and many others didn't take the trouble to inform themselves what was really happening to the company in their charge a whole lot earlier.
As to the pilot quarrel - why was Crossair profitable - the darling of all and the recipient of the MD-80 fleet? Because, in a Swiss kind of way, they were low cost - including much lower - some would say bread line salaries. The pilots took the terms available, or they wouldn't have joined. Swissair came from the annals of aviation history as a prestigious airline with well paid staff.
Try to integrate a high cost luxury line with a low cost local airline and you get a mess, unless you can get a good compromise. Of course everyone thinks he has compromised enough. The atmosphere between the ex SR and ex LX pilots has deteriorated to the level you can read on this page and worse. There used to be professional respect between the separate airlines - and not a little sympathy from the Swisssair pilots, for the Crossair pilots on lower salaries. Efforts were undertaken way back, at union level, to define an integrated pilot career model, where all pilots would pass through Crossair and Swissair and things would be fair for all. These efforts were always sidelined - sometimes by the Swissair/Crossair management and sometimes by the two pilot unions themselves but the basic goodwill was there.
Now, when this model could have been re-activated, the pilots are at each others' throats - everything is duplicated in middle management, with two fleets - two airlines in effect and the scene is set for disaster. Add a layoff scenario and a dash of fear and you get the picture.
Labeling one block of pilots arrogant and the others dumb won't help. You may all be flying for easyJet one day...