Airbus Industrie Presents Its Case in U.S. Ad Campaign

Europe’s Airbus Industrie said Sunday it was launching a two-month editorial advertising campaign aimed at explaining its position in the U.S.-European aircraft trade war.

The company, a consortium of British, French, West German and Spanish aircraft manufacturers, said it was running quarter- or full-page “advertorials” beginning in today’s editions of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and 13 other major newspapers and magazines.

The ads are being run about a week before senior U.S. and West European trade officials are to meet in London to discuss American complaints of unfair European subsidies for Airbus passenger jetliners.

Airbus is the leading competitor to U.S. aircraft makers Boeing Co. and McDonnell Douglas Corp. in the multibillion-dollar long-and medium-range airliner industry.

As the 17-year-old Airbus increasingly expands its presence in the market, it has become the target of U.S. government criticism that it was being subsidized unfairly by European governments.

Three European governments announced $4.5 billion in aid to Airbus this spring. However, European trade negotiators claim that Pentagon contracts constitute a kind of subsidy to U.S. companies, a claim U.S. negotiators deny.