Solidarity!

with...

1.  pit pilot against pilot
2.  pit ground worker against pilot
3.  pit customer against pilot
4.  pit the general public against pilot

The following two articles were copied from the AirlinePilots.com website.  These methods are occurring at Federal Express at this time, directed against both the contract battle by pilots and unionization efforts by ground workers.  Don't some of these methods sound familiar to you?

Marty Levitt, author of both articles, is a former professional union-buster "gone good."  For 20 years he was one of the "best" in the business, and Levitt knows intimately all the legal (and illegal) strategies and tactics used by corporations against working people.

Other Marty Levitt resources include:
1.  his Real Audio interview on the AirlinePilots.com website.
2.  his book "Confessions of a Union Buster" by Martin Levitt & Terry Conrow, 1993,
          Crown Publishers, New York, N.Y.
3.  the 25-minute videotape "Former Professional Union-Buster Marty Levitt Tells All"
          available from the Teamsters Union Organizing Department, 25 Louisiana Ave. NW,
          Washington, D.C., 20001

article #1
DIVIDE AND CONQUER
By Marty Levitt, Labor Day 1998

I work for Northwest Airlines and know the company has never been financially healthier. Does management have motives, other than economic, for what appears to be irrational and destructive behavior against the Pilot's Union (ALPA), the employees from the other five Union bargaining units, and even the traveling public? You can bet a paycheck they do... and you will win your bet.

The situation at NWA is a clear and blatant illustration of union busting at its dirtiest. What NWA management is doing is what I guided similar management to do for twenty years. Divide and conquer the workforce at any expense. The war being waged against the Pilots and the other Union workers has nothing to do with bottom line issues. It is all about MANAGEMENT'S OBSESSION FOR CONTROL!  Even though it was Union concessions that allowed this airline to return to prosperity, memories are short when management's fuel is a mixture of "ignorance, fear, greed, and ego."

This deadly fuel mixed with the control factor has this company and it's "hired corporate terrorists" (union busters) set on the following motives only:
1.fracture the solidarity of the Pilot's Union (ALPA) by dragging this process out and placing well timed false statements;
2.attempt to fracture the solidarity of the other five Unions through truth twisting, manipulation, confusion, and illusion;
3.attempt to pit all six Unions against one another in an effort to create a major "scab force";
4.lie to the general public through the media to make the Pilots appear to be "selfish, already overpaid, and inconsiderate";
5.attempt to get government intervention to frustrate all employees, break their resolve, and create the illusion that all Union's are weak; and
6.bust the Unions or dramatically fracture their unity.

I have no doubt that NWA can comfortably afford to agree to all Pilot issues on the table. Unfortunately, they will not. Instead they will boast about and use their $3 billion dollar "war chest" to do whatever it takes to achieve their exclusive goal to try to take back CONTROL, even if that involves ruining the working lives, family lives, and general well being of their entire workforce. This sick union busting mentality can be overcome and, the solution is rather simple. STAY UNITED AND TOGETHER, AND, STICK WITH THE TRUTH. Once NWA management is exposed for its inhuman and dirty motives, there can be a positive conclusion.


article #2
FLY IN THE WEB
By Marty Levitt, August 1998

At our company, we are involved in contract negotiations with management. Recently, things have not been going so well for the company. Management continues to make stupid mistakes and the pilots are becoming unified as a result. Last week management started showing up in the crew lounge trying to be buddy-buddy with the line pilots... asking questions, soliciting feedback, and asking individuals to come in for "interviews" about what's "bugging" them.

What are they up to? The scenario described in this question is one of the oldest and most widely used tactics in union busting. I used to refer to it as "the fix-it period." It is a cleverly disguised device intended to confuse and divide bargaining unit employees into believing they can resolve problems faster and more effectively communicating directly with management than through their bargaining representative.

Here's how it works. Management's anti-union consultants select a small group of "friendly" and somewhat credible managers and assign each of them a given number of employees (read pilots). Their assignment is to get together in small meetings and individual sessions with these individuals and create the illusion that they share equal frustrations about unresolved bargaining issues and will fight on their behalf. They preach the importance of the "direct relationship" and that they are there not only to listen, but to follow up with action. In every session they subtly undermine the Union and encourage their audience to accept management's mistakes as unintentional and correctable from within. It's the old "give management a chance" crap. To make this illusion appear real, some positive changes do follow.

However, the changes are very insignificant and almost always cosmetic. For example: Upgrades in the crew lounge, recreational activities, etc. The changes or improvements never involve serious contract issues or grievances, but attempt to manipulate employees into believing that management is listening and acting in a positive fashion. Although some pilots may buy into this ruse, the exclusive motives of management and its hired union busters are to: fracture the solidarity of the Union, identify and deal accordingly with perceived "troublemakers;" i.e. Union leaders and strong supporters, and gain access to privileged Union strategies and information in search of tactics to further undermine, fracture, or break the Union. Individuals who buy into this scheme generally find themselves winding up like "the fly in the spider web."


The old "end-around" play
{October 17 letter from a concerned pilot}

<<
Bob,
This is something that you need to get out.  Our fellow employees have to know what is going on.

This morning, 3600 FedEx pilots got a SDR delivery of a stinking piece of crap, labled "US Major Airlines Salary Survey", put out by a UAL captain who moonlights for extra money.  Essentially he is trying to legitimize a bunch of lies and damned statistics provided his company by FedEx management, without researching whether or not the data is factual. It isn't. No one on the union side had seen any of the figures until yesterday and the report is dated the 15th. FedEx has got themselves a "Hired Gun" to go hot and heavy into "Union Busting". 
There are probably a few in the pilot ranks who might be swayed with this propaganda bull  shit, but for sure, it is going to be used as a tool against us with our fellow employees, when things begin to heat up down the road.