(FORTUNE Magazine) – The dogfight for UAL's United Airlines may soon be over. A group led by CEO Stephen Wolf and backed by the pilots seems to have put together the financing for a $6.75 billion bid. This tops the $6.2 billion offer by billionaire Marvin Davis, but Davis says he will match the new price if Wolf's bid unravels. In the meantime, much of the rest of the U.S. airline industry continues to be buffeted by takeover talk. Stock prices soared through early September, when they began to ease off (see chart). Foreign airlines still eye partnerships with U.S. counterparts lest they get locked out of U.S. hubs that feed so much global travel. Says Sir Colin Marshall, chief executive of British Airways, explaining his $750 million stake in Wolf's bid: ''It's difficult to contemplate serving all the major markets in the world without a strategic alliance like the one we have with United.'' Other foreign carriers with investments in U.S. airlines include SAS, which has 9.8% of Texas Air, owner of Continental and Eastern, and KLM, which will have about 8% of NWA, owner of Northwest. Likewise, U.S. airlines are looking overseas. AMR (American) has already grabbed a morsel of Air New Zealand. All the airline turmoil leaves union leaders divided. United pilots, led by Frederick ''Rick'' Dubinsky, are backing CEO Wolf's takeover with $200 million from their pension fund and $371 million in pay cuts and other givebacks over seven years. This would make United the largest employee-owned company in the & country. The airline's flight attendants are talking about joining in. The machinists, who blocked a pilots' takeover in 1987, don't like this one either. But they are expected to begin talks with the buyout group soon. Over at Eastern, meanwhile, the pilots' union has kicked out its former leader, Jack Bavis, furious that he suggested the 2,500 pilots still on strike go back to work. Almost 650 already have, and they, with new hires, have been enough to fly the shrunken fleet. For now, the union's plan to cripple the airline and force out the despised CEO, Frank Lorenzo, is stalled. In Bavis's place, the striking pilots elected Skip Copeland, who had headed the New York chapter. Copeland hopes that Congress will fight Lorenzo on the union's behalf. The danger for UAL remains the $5.8 billion extra debt Wolf's group would take on. Says John Pincavage of Transportation Group, an aircraft financing firm: ''Whoever takes over an airline using a lot of debt better pray that somebody takes over their competitors. If everyone but American is burdened with high interest payments, ((CEO)) Bob Crandall will attack like an unleashed lion.''

CHART: NOT AVAILABLE CREDIT: NO CREDIT CAPTION: UP, UP, AND AWAY The shares of other carriers climbed in the slipstream of the sudden hunger for United