someone gets it.
As much as the AA/US fanclub would like to believe otherwise, the DL-US slot deal gave DL a huge win over US... even before yesterday. DL gained 3X more slots at LGA than US gained at DCA and DL patiently waited and helped push the deal thru the DOJ knowing that US would never be able to become larger at DCA after the slot deal. That is exactly what happened.
IIRC, DL traded away 42 slot pairs at DCA and AA/US will now have to divest 44 actual flights (above the leased slots) which could be used by low fare carriers.
Perhaps there will be people who will realize that service to small and medium sized cities will be sacrificed in order to provide LFC access to DCA. Maybe it will happen but too late... only weakens AA/US' position on the east coast since DL serves many of those same cities not only from LGA but also from its other eastern US hubs. AA/US will be reducing the number of hubs it serves from some small cities which will weaken its overall east coast presence in those east coast cities.
Despite their bravado, AA/US execs are either scared to death or deeply in denial about the effect that allowing low fare carriers to control 15% of AA/US flights (and even more seats) in a market where the LFCs have little incentive to deeply discount because there is no carrier to push their fares down. All they need to do is price lower than AA/US which shouldn't be hard to do since they have costs 10% or more lower than AA/US.
Yes, DL outsmarted US with the slot deal and now AA-US is trying to put the best face forward as the government pushes thru a plan that is seeing the biggest wealth transfer to low fare carriers from network carriers the industry has ever seen. With AA/US costs mid-tier even among network carriers, AA/US is very poorly prepared to withstand the onslaught.
But we don't have to worry about any of that today, right? This is the day and week and month to celebrate getting the deal done and savor the promises that have been made regarding pay raises whether they will ever materialize or not. The reality of the future will take care of itself - in the future.