Originally Posted by justageek
...So my question is, given that terrorists seem to feel less animosity towards the countries where the other alliances are hubbed (Netherlands, France, Germany) than they do towards the UK (and US), will passengers shift to the other alliances during the upcoming years?
Let's review the airports which have had actual terrorist attacks related to the middle east in the past 30 years:
VIE (airport attack using machine guns on waiting pax) 1985
FCO (similar to VIE but targeting the El Al ticket counter) 1985
So a Star hub and a Skyteam hub have been attacked (with dozens of pax killed). I cannot recall any other successful attacks on airports (there was a shooting at LAX a few years ago, but it was personal and not terrorist action, and there have been attacks in Sri Lanka and Phillipines but not related to the current threat.
So how much impact did Star and Skyteam suffer from those attacks in 1985? Have you been avoiding travel to VIE or FCO since then? Time passes, and it makes little or no difference in the long run (in my opinion).