American Airlines’ Network Chief Is Reportedly Out—His Boss Wants To Reverse The Retreat He Managed

American Airlines’ network planning chief Brian Znotins is leaving, according to aviation watchdog JonNYC. The executive who defended pulling back from major cities and long haul international flying flying is departing as Chief Commercial Officer Nat Pieper lays out plans to rebuild both. American wants to compete for premium customers in major markets again, and that requires a different approach to where it flies. Now confirmed by 3 folks. — JonNYC (@xJonNYC) October 14, 2026 There could well be something else to the departure, but the strategy Znotins spent years managing is hard to reconcile with the airline Pieper now says American wants to be. And the contrast goes back further than American: Znotins ran United’s network before Scott Kirby arrived and began rebuilding the domestic flying that carrier had allowed to deteriorate. Another Flight To Indianapolis, Rather Than A New Flight To Asia In January 2023, I reported Znotins’ explanation to employees of why American preferred domestic and short haul international growth: Our biggest strength is in domestic. So just like any company, if you’re making a lot of money on product line A, and you’re not making as much money on product line B, what are you going to make more of? ..For us, product line A is our domestic and short haul international network, that’s where we make the most money in our network right now. He made it a clear contrast of chasing sexy international routes and making money (although American hasn’t been making money): The airline bloggers…won’t be as excited about that sixth trip from DFW to Indy, that sixth trip from DFW to Indy is what we’re going to be earning a profit on instead of going to some speculative destination in Europe or Asia where you don’t have as many people wanting to go there and we’re not as successful on those routes. There’s nothing wrong with another profitable Indianapolis flight as such, except to the extent limited aircraft are assigned there rather than someplace where it might earn more, and whether you’re doing the network accounting wrong and ignoring the effects on brand, card card acquisition and spend. During the pandemic, I reported Vasu Raja joking that Znotins was traveling around Mexico looking for airports American didn’t already serve, hoping to find paved runways. Mexico was open, demand was booming, and American could fill the flights. Finding somewhere profitable to send an airplane in 2021 made sense but it wasn’t a strategy that would work to win customers back in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York as travel recovered. Znotins also favored using smaller aircraft to add frequencies rather than widebodies – and American is in the final stages of considering a widebody aircraft order. When I covered his Airbus A321XLR plans in October 2023, one use was two smaller flights to a destination instead of one larger aircraft. That can produce a better schedule and make thinner routes work, but it doesn’t offer the range and seats to rebuild an Asia gateway. Los Angeles Shows How Much The Strategy Has Changed Znotins explained in 2021 that American was scaling back Los Angeles widebody flying and intended to make Seattle its primary Asia gateway, working with Alaska Airlines. In December 2022, he laid out the economics again: The challenge we have with LA..is that LA was not profitable for us. But what we found is that the losses we were generating there were concentrated in just a handful of long haul routes. The rest of the hub actually did fairly well. So flying to China, flying to South America, that was tens of millions of dollars in losses. …And what we found is that LA to Asia is almost in a perpetual state of oversupply because of all these foreign flags that need to be in LA even if the capacity isn’t warranted. And so flying to Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong, all of these routes were very challenging for us to turn a profit. And we said if we can take these airplanes, move them elsewhere around the country, some to transatlantic, some to deep south from places like Miami, and New York and Dallas. Now Pieper tells Cranky Flier that Los Angeles will again be American’s Pacific gateway. He says: I fundamentally believe we need to fly our own airplanes to the big markets in the world Pieper acknowledged that the Sun Belt focus had damaged American’s ability to attract local customers elsewhere. He wants a schedule that works for Los Angeles residents, with American flying its own planes to Asia. Partners remain valuable, but they don’t replace that presence. Brett Snyder noted this issue had produced disagreement at the top. I heard Pieper describe American’s ambition at the oneworld Loyalty Summit last month to be the premier global airline based in the United States. Reversing the retreat from Los Angeles has to be a part of that. Scott Kirby Understood How The Pieces Fit Together A Decade Ago Znotins came to American in January 2020 after three years at WestJet. Before that, he spent more than 17 years at United and Continental, including as vice president of network and managing director of international and long-range planning. Kirby became United’s president in August 2016. Znotins departed about a month later. Kirby argued that United’s domestic hubs had become too small and its schedules too weak. They needed more destinations, better connections, more frequencies and appropriately sized aircraft to become useful to customers again. And he explicitly connected that to credit cards. I covered his explanation on United’s October 2017 earnings call: better connections win customers, and those customers become prospects for the United card. If the schedule doesn’t work, they have little reason to want the card either. I returned to that argument during his January 2018 investor presentation, and wrote about the Znotins–Kirby contrast again in August. Kirby’s prescription then was more domestic flying. Pieper’s includes more international flying. Both address the missing part of the network that prevents an airline from winning a customer’s broader business. United needed domestic reach to complement its global network. American needs global reach and stronger major-market schedules to complement its domestic strengths. American’s Sun Belt strategy also promised credit card growth. It bet that dominating smaller markets and relying on partners internationally would accomplish it. The disagreement is over which customers American can win that way, how much they spend, and whether partner flights adequately substitute for American’s own service in places like Los Angeles. They’d fallen from first to third in airline cobrand card spending. A good Citi contract helps, but American still needs to give customers a reason to choose the airline and keep using the card. A New Network Chief Will Need Airplanes Znotins wasn’t opposed to every international opportunity. In 2023 he discussed possible Singapore and South Pacific flying from Los Angeles. He also explained how premium-heavy 787-9s could make winter Europe flying more attractive. And those priorities weren’t his alone. Parker and Isom presided over the fleet retirements and years of retreat. Isom was in the employee meetings defending American’s approach. Replacing the network planner doesn’t erase their decisions or supply the planes needed to change them. American confirmed in June that it was seeking proposals for new widebody aircraft. By September, the campaign was described as up to 65 planes, with deliveries in the 2030s and replacement of 47 Boeing 777-200ERs a major purpose. Pieper’s Los Angeles plans also depend on completing terminal construction. Some growth is expected next year, but the broader rebuild takes longer. Initial expansion will have to use the existing fleet and aircraft already on order. American will have to decide how many aging 777s to keep, how quickly to take deliveries already on order, and how much of the new purchase will expand the fleet. A planner charged with rebuilding Los Angeles needs aircraft to add those flights without taking them away from hubs like Chicago.