James, do you think US wants to see an influx of overseas travellers claiming award seats on US flights? I doubt it. The alliance thing works both ways, although I will admit that US travellers are more advantaged by getting access to overseas destinations. With AA part of the alliance, its not clear why US would benefit anyone.

Curiously, AA's reason for eliminating mileage expiration had nothing to do with making the FF program more competitive as some believe. It was driven strictly by revenue considerations. According to one article I read on-line (sorry can't recall where it was), AA was not getting as much revenue from selling FF miles to other firms as some other airlines were (like DL). Customers were steering away from collecting AA miles because of the expiration and opting for miles from FF programs with fewer expiration rules. This mirrors my own experience quite well. I usually stayed away from building a big balance of miles with AA or UA because of the expiration thing. Now I can feel free to hand Hilton my AA FF # when I double dip!!