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Aviation History
1990
1990 - 0005.PDF
FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL Quadran! House. The Quadrant Sutton Surrey SM2 5AS. England EDITORIAL ENQUIRIES: 01-661 3321 EDITORIAL FAX: 01-661 3840 DISPLAYADVERTISING: 01-661 3315 DISPLAY ADV. FAX: 01-661 8981 CLASSIFIED ADVERTISING: 01-661 6373 CLASSIFIED ADV. FAX: 01-642 4431 TELEX: 892084 REEDBPG EDITOR Allan Winn 01-661 3883 DEPUTY EDITOR Gtaham Warwick 01-661 8808 ASSISTANT EDITOR ART AND PRODUCTION Forbes MulchOI-66138521 ASSISTANT EDITOR, SPECIAL PROJECTS Tom Hamill 01-6613096 NEWS EDITOR Andrew Chuter 01-661 3843 OPERATIONS EDITOR Mike Gaines 01-6618809 TECHNICAL EDITOR Guy Norris 01-661 3835 AIR TRANSPORT EDITOR David Learmounl 01-661 3845 REPORTERS Eric Beech 01-6613837 Andrew Cadogan 01-6613844 Kieran Daly 01-6613836 Simon Elliotl 01-6613838 ' Ian Gooid 01-661 3834 ' Alan Posllethwaile 01-661 3839 CHIEF SUB EDITOR Stephen Spark 01-661 3847 SUB EDITOR Annabel Goddard 01-661 3848 ART EDITOR Colin Paine01-661 3850 PHOTOGRAPHER Janice Lowe 01 -661 3827 TECHNICAL ARTISTS Paul CouperOI-661 8047 lraEplonOI-6618054 Tim Hall 01-661 8047 John Marsden 01-6618054 WASHINGTON BUREAU Julian Moxon (202) 547-2624 FAX (202) 547-5338- LOS ANGELES BUREAU John Bailey (714) 760-6618 FAX (714) 760-6619 PARIS CORRESPONDENT Gilbert Sedbon(1) 4825 5261 ISRAEL CORRESPONDENT Arie Egozi (3) 9671155 US WEST COAST CORRESPONDENT Norman Lynn (408) 778-0889 FAX (408) 778-9976 WEST GERMAN CORRESPONDENT Stefan Giesenheyner 06121526894 FAX 061 21 529779 SPACEFLIGHT CORRESPONDENT Tim Furniss 02375 756 FAX 02375 600 DISPLAY ADVERTISEMENT SALES MANAGER Clive Richardson 01-6613315 VICE-PRESIDENT US SALES John Tidy (714) 756-1057 CLASSIFIED ADVERTISEMENT SALES 01 661 6373 RECRUITMENT 01 6616373 ADVERTISEMENT PRODUCTION Howard Mason 01-661 3267 For full advertisement sales information see inside back page. SUBSCRIPTIONS MANAGER A Walden (0444) 441212 SUBSCRIPTION ENQUIRIES Oaklield House, Perrymounl Road. Haywards Healh, Wesl Sussex RH16 3DH, England BACK NUMBERS Limited numbers ol RECENT ISSUES ONLY are available al £1 50/copy (CASH WITH ORDER ONLY) Irom Flight International, Room L531, Quadrant House, The Quadrant, Sutton, Surrey SM2 5AS, UK NEWSTRADE SALES ENQUIRIES to Quadrant Publishing Services, 01-661 3380. USA NEWSSTAND SALES ENQUIRIES Worldwide Media Service Inc. (toll-free) 1 -800-345-6478 Lisa' Member ol the Audit Bureau of Circulation COMMENT Interesting times Prediction is at best a dangerous science; at worst a harmless indulgence. None of the predictions of ten years ago suggested that, as the decade closed, American paratroops would be dropping on Panama; that Romania would be embroiled in a bloody revolu tion; that its Eastern Bloc neighbours would be coming to grips with the unknowns of non- communist rule. None predicted the massive rationalisation of the world's—and particularly America's—major airlines; nor the mind-numbing flood of orders which those rationalised airlines have placed. Far less could any seer have predicted the catastrophes and di sasters which bedev illed civil air trans port in the last ten years, from Erebus to Lockerbie, from Chicago to Keg- worth, from Korea misplaced to Gulf misidentified. No crystal ball saw Brit ain's V-bomber force striking its last blows in the south Atlantic. No astrologer saw the Soviets' red star fought to an incon clusive standstill in Afghanistan. Pity, then, those who are expected to predict the unpredictable. Who would be willing to predict that the USA's three rapid interventions of thel980s (Iran, Grenada and Panama) are or are not the prototypes for future military actions, rather than the giant set-piece confrontations between the forces of NATO and the Warsaw Pact on which conventional planning has been based? Future conflict is, alas, inevitable, if it is to be small-scale and localised, will the future technical requirement be for a combination of intensive local defence and limited but highly sophisticated long-range strike/intervention, all with conven tional weapons? Does that in turn mean that the American programmes most under threat from defence secretary Cheney's axe are, in fact, the ones most relevant to the future? Perhaps those who support B-2, V-22 and C-17 (in a limited way) for overseas intervention, and ATF deployed solely for home defence, have it right. Perhaps the Europeans, whose goals seem to change from group defence to individual defence as the shape of the hitherto common foe changes, are faced with individual priorities so redefined that common solutions like EFA or a European battlefield helicopter are no longer relevant. Will independent-thinking democracies like Prediction in aviation is merely a form of gambling." Poland and Czechoslovakia retain their existing defence and procurement policies? NATO and Warsaw Pact leaders would like to think so, because that preserves some stability on which to base their planning, but that thinking may be wishful indeed. Predictions in the civil air transport market are, if anything, just as fraught with danger. The existing airlines believe the world air travel market will grow by leaps and bounds, and have backed their predictions with unprecedented orders with the major manufacturers. Such pre dictions are, however, based on assumptions made in the 1980s, not experience of the 1990s. The predictions state that air travel will increase dramat ically in a newly in tegrated European Community: a future less - defence - orient ed Europe may decide to put more of its resources into more politically sale able rail travel, as France has done. The experts pre dict that the emerg ing nations such as China will experi ence vast increases in demand for air travel: as centralised planning of centralised economies falls from favour, smaller self-sufficient economies may generate less-than-predicted need for travel. The prophets see a burgeoning leisure travel- market, but many existing leisure destinations are already overcrowded, and opponents of the fur ther despoliation of undeveloped areas in the name of tourism are stronger now than ever. The airlines have ordered huge numbers of new aeroplanes, but their host governments have not ordered the enhanced infrastructures to accom modate them. Will the airlines accept fewer aircraft than predicted, or will bottlenecked coun tries be provoked into panic reactions? The answers to none of these questions can be given now: prediction in aviation (as in world affairs as a whole) is merely a form of gambling in which the odds change ever more quickly. The trouble is that the social and industrial conse quences of political decisions and changes work on far longer cycles than do politics. That far- reaching planning decisions must continue to be made in ever-more turbulent circumstances is one of the great burdens of modern life. The planners must regard themselves the victims of the ancient Confucian curse: "May you live in interesting times". FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 3-9 January 1990
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