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by Chris Bryant

There’s chutzpah and then there’s the deal that Airbus SE just struck with Bombardier Inc. By acquiring a 50 percent stake in Bombardier’s struggling C Series commercial jet program — for free — Airbus has handed Boeing Co., its U.S. nemesis, a whopping black eye.

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Fearing the C Series could let Bombardier become “another Airbus”, Boeing successfully persuaded the Trump administration to slap massive duties on the aircraft, even though it doesn’t really offer a similar product. But if Boeing thought Bombardier was going to fall on its sword, boy was it wrong.

Airbus can now bring to bear the full weight of its international sales, supply chain and maintenance capabilities to the C Series. And by adding a final assembly for the aircraft in Alabama, Airbus might make the Americans think twice about those punitive tariffs (jobs for U.S. workers!).