Open on Closed Skies?

New Zealand Listener, Volume 10, Issue 242, 11 February 1944, Page 4

Open on Closed Skies?

What Freedom of The Air Will Mean

will have to face the vast and complex problems of international air transport — of arranging the routes and bases, building the planes, untying the intricate knots of law and usage. It is a problem as big as the world itself, for air transport will cover the whole face of the globe and, what’s more, go five or six miles up in the air. It is also a problem that has never before confronted the world, so involved is it with the ways of war and of peace, with the needs of trade as well as transportation, with the dealings of diplomats as well as of businessmen. The people who are working on the problem have looked to history for some solid guidance. But they have been able to find only a few crumbs of precedent. The biggest fight is over the biggest phrase, "Freedom of the Air," a phrase which has become a catchword before it has become a definition. In itself, freedom of the air would mean that anybody could fly anywhere at any time for any peaceful purpose. But no freedom of the air advocate goes so far (except, possibly, Vice-President Henry Wallace, of U.S.A., who has envisioned an international air authority which would open all skies equally to all peaceable countries). The British refer to "freedom of the air’ as "open sky." The opposite of open sky is "closed sky," and it is from this point that any realistic discussion of air rights begins. At various conventions held before 1930 most of the countries of the world agreed that a nation had sovereign tights to all the air that lay above it. No other nation could fly a plane through this air without permission. Along with this closed-sky doctrine of sovereignty, most nations recognised the rights of "innocent passage" which gave any private, non-commercial plane the right to fly anywhere except over restricted areas. It also granted the right to land for emergency repair, refuelling or refuge from weather. Since innocent passage did not extend to commercial planes, it was of no importance for air transport. Possible Compromises Post-war air arrangements will undoubtedly fall somewhere between closed and open sky. With air sovereignty as the base, modified agreements can be made for commercial planes. Such arrangements could be: (1) The right to fly over a country without landing. S OONER or later, the world

(2) The right to fly to a country, land, but fly no farther across the country. (3) The right to fly into and over a country with the privilege of landing for fuel, repairs or safety; this is simply the right of air transit. (4) The right to fly into a country, land, drop off and pick up cargo and passengers coming from or going to foreign points, (5) All the rights of No. 4 with the additional right to stop anywhere within the country to take on or drop off passengers and cargo at any point for any other point, The last is really the open sky. Arrangement No. 3, the right of air transport, has been suggested by President Roosevelt as the starting point of a post-war air agreement with Great Britain. As the President put it, a Canadian air line flying to the Bahamas could be permitted to land in New York and Miami but not to carry American passengers between those cities. Arrangement No. 4, which would allow passengers from or to Canada or the Bahamas to be loaded or unloaded at New York and Miami, is the one favoured by many USS. air officials, and may be the one actually in the President’s mind. It can be called the right of commercial air outlets. Deals Before Phrases When it gets down to cases, the settling of the post-war air will be a matter of deals rather than phrases. Despite the fact that the world has operated from a closed-sky basis, international air transport managed to stretch itself over much of the world. Before the war, U.S. planes flown by Pan-American Airways had the right to fly into 38 countries. Germany had landing arrangements with 33 countries, England with 31, the Netherlands with 27, France with 22. Under some of these agreements, countries granted each other reciprocal flying rights through their air. Pan-American, however, made non-reciprocal deals because, as a private company, it had no right to make deals for the U.S. air and because most

of the countries to which it flew were not interested in flying into the U/S. The U.S., which always advocated freedom of the air, refused to let either the Dutch or Germans into the U.S. air. It did have reciprocal agreements with England, France, Canada, and Colombia. The only country which took commercial advantage of its reciprocal rights was Canada, whose planes flew regularly into the U.S. The closed sky did not always aid aerial efficiency. Germany and Russia made and broke off aerial relations a couple of times before the war. Turkey was reluctant to let anybody fly over her territory, forcing England to land her planes in Greece and grant concessions to the Greeks. Iran forced England to make an extensive detour around her borders because the English did not want to fly the dangerous desert-mountain.route the Iranians had plotted for foreign planes. Britain Deeply Concerned The fight for top place in the post-war air is much more desperate for the British than for the Americans. Britain’s economy leans: far more heavily on foreign trade than America’s does. In prewar days, the British Empire was involved in 40 per cent of the world’s international trade. The revenue and influence she derives from shipping and other accessories to foreign trade are absolutely vital to Great Britain. Without them she "~would be a puny power. But to the U.S. foreign trade in itself is of lesser importance. On the other hand, Great Britain with its Empire owns the most nearly complete chain of round-the-world air-base sites. Only in the Pacific is there any break in the chain. Britain, therefore, can be more independent of foreign air bases than any other country. The U.S. is poor in bases. Eastward its aerial sovereignty ends at the Atlantic seaboard. Southward it can go no farther than Panama. Only in the Pacific does it have any long reach. There it can go to Manila and to Alaska without crossing or stopping at any foreign place. So far as other countries are concerned, the U.S. itself is an aerial end-of-the-line. Only planes flying between Canada, the Caribbean, and Latin America will want to cross it. The advantage is not, however, quite as one-sided as it seems. By making deals with Portugal and France, whose empires afford possible stepping-stones (continued on next page)

WE suggested hast week that those who advocate national control of the skies when the war ends should study an air atlas. Since that comment was made English and American newspapers have arrived with articles both advocating and opposing the "open sky." Here is a condensation of a review of the whole position in New York "Life," with some slight additions from other sources.

(continued from previous page) around the globe, the U.S. could get along without British bases. Britain, at the same time, is blocked in the Pacific without the right to land in Hawaii or to cross Alaska. England could and, if pressed, certainly would, offer rich inducements to France and Portugal in otder to keep them from making deals with the U.S. that might undermine Britain’s bargaining position. Bargaining Assets of U.S. Geography aside, the U.S. has some very important bargaining assets. After the war, it will have great numbers of transport planes to trade for bases or landing rights. Similarly, it will have food and other materials to trade. The U.S, now knows more about international air transport than any other country, having piled on top of Pan-American’s excellent pre-war work the experience of its airtransport commands. Some countries will want to be main trade routes and will welcome most warmly the lines that can offer the best service. The U.S. is a great and rich trading centre, a source and a market which many nations will want to reach through air lines. They will, therefore, be eager to offer reciprocal flying rights.

The Soviet Union has permitted several foreign lines to come into Russia on a reciprocal basis. She herself has been a great internal user of air transport, leading the world in the amount of ait cargo carried. Although some U.S. airmen feel that the Soviet Union will not permit such transit through her airways, others are optimistically projecting Far East routes through Siberia. The Far East routes also land in Japan, which has always closed her sky to foreign transport planes. Air transport men expect that military defeat will open Japan’s air and bases-and also Germany’s-to her conquerors. Will Air-Transport Pay? All these people want to get into the international air-line business because they think there will be money in it, Although this is certainly the most obvious of reasons, there is conflict of ‘opinion over its application to the international air business. Some experts insist that there will be so little traffic that the only profits will come from government subsidy. The most sober calculations are based on pre-war ship-passenger figures. This is a businesslike procedure, but it may be as dangerous to predict air traffic on the basis of shipping traffic as it once was to predict railroad traffic on the basis of stage-coach or canal-boat traffic. The speed and convenience of air travel will attract whole new classes of international travellers, This will particularly affect the U.S. because Americans have become the world’s great tourists, Estimates of air traffic during the immediate post-war generally agree with those made by Edward P, Warner, of the Civil Aeronautics Board. Mr. Warner’ figures that for the first year after the war about 600 people a day will want to fly the Atlantic between the U.S. and Europe. That means 300 Passengers each way. To carry this load in 57planes, which will operate about twothirds full, will require eight daily flights in each direction, They would not be nonstop flights because operating costs rise sharply when fuel for hops longer than 1250 miles has to be carried. Bigger planes could and eventually will go nonstop, but if the planes are bigger the

frequency of flights would be less. Warner believes that the public is more interested in the convenience of frequent flights than in the glamour of high speeds. Besides, high-speed planes would cost more. The nearest thing to an estimate of transatlantic fares has been made by Pan-American, which thinks it can carry passengers from New York to London for $186.30 round trip-but not right after the war. One thing is pretty certain. There will be all kinds of planes used-planes built for speed, for high altitude, for economy for cargo-carrying, for luxurious super-first-class travelling. So far as cargo is concerned, the whole picture is complicated by the fact that there is no U.S. plane now flying which was designed as a cargo plane. The present cargo planes are all converted passenger or military ships. At first only costly cargo which can pay a premium for quick delivery will be shipped by air. The most optimistic estimates of cost per ton still give ships a huge edge in economy, except, perhaps, for compact, highly valued items. America Can't Pre-Empt More than to any other nation the war has given the world’s air to America. The hundreds of thousands of Americans who have learned to fly, the thousands of airmen to whom a round trip to India is almost as casual an event as a long weekend drive, the many men who have looked down at the passing oceans and continents and felt the round earth shrink in size-none of them will want to give up any of the air they have taken over. There is too much glory and excitement in it, too many rich prizes to be won through it, too many conquests to be gained in it, But America, though it has become the world’s greatest aerial power, cannot preempt the air. It cannot have all the planes and the bases and the trade. The U.S. cannot expect to be permitted into everybody’s air without permitting almost everybody into its air. Up to now, all bargainings have started with everybody professing admiration for the open sky but sticking hard to the closed sky. It is time to admit openly that some kind of open sky is the more practical. Only under an open sky will international air-trade thrive. Feet on the Ground It is a safe and comfortable thing to keep both feet on the ground and be very hard-headed about the post-war air. The experts can be conservative about the kinds of planes, the number of future air passengers, the comparative virtues of other forms of transportation. For the immediate post-war, this seems sensible, But the world must realise how small a suggestion of the awful might of air power this war has revealed, how small and foolish our present planes will seem in the eyes of history, how greatly airplanes will take over future travel. The fact that so many people are fighting to get into the air and stay there is perhaps the healthiest thing about the situation. The conflicts show that the enormous importance of the air is really recognised. They may force the leaders of nations into facing the problem boldly. The least they can do is to force America’s leaders to formulate and present a concrete policy before the huge question dissolves into a stupid debate of catchwords and a programme of makeshifts,