Is the Swiss Aviation Industry Firmly in German Hands?

Dear Readers

“Switzerland is an island!” exclaimed Hansjürg Fehr, president of the Social Democratic Party, some time ago on a political talk show. “Switzerland is not an island,” Federal Councilor Pascal Couchepin remarked recently. What am I, as an ordinary citizen, supposed to believe? The fact that Swiss taxpayers effectively gave Swissair away to Lufthansa is being celebrated in today’s newspapers by the current Swiss management, who are beaming with satisfaction. The names in the accompanying captions are all German. Whether and how flights are allowed to land at Kloten is also decided by our northern neighbors. Politicians argue that this is about protecting the population. Really? What about the people in our Alpine valleys along the Gotthard, the

San Bernardino, and so on? They are suffocating in the noise and stench not only from trucks but especially—at the beginning and end of holidays and vacations in the German federal states—from the “fuel-efficient small cars” driven by German vacationers. Is this really about the people? Our political leadership isn’t just giving away airlines, but—and this is a thousand times worse—the health of our children!

Bertrand Piccard’s “Solar Impulse” project is to be sponsored by Deutsche Bank—I wonder if his grandfather would have been pleased—and the F3B World Gliding Championships in Emmen seemed firmly in German hands—even down to the lettering on the winners’ podium— “Two-time F3B World Champion Andreas Böhlen (Switzerland)

had no chance this time,” as reported in a German model-building magazine; I see it differently! Fortunately, at least the 35-MHz frequencies are being rendered obsolete by the 2.4 GHz band. The “island phobia” of the left seems to have been put into perspective by the developments described here—if anything, we’re a peninsula of Germany. This is not an indictment of our neighboring country, but rather my boundless admiration for Swiss stupidity and the policy of appeasement pursued by our national leaders. That’s probably also why, for once, we’re reporting on the Jet Worldmasters from a purely Swiss perspective.

Enjoy
the read, Emil Ch. Giezendanner