Perhaps someone more experienced can enlighten me; does this really constitute fair use under US copyright law?
Also, even if it meets the requirements for fair use in the US, is this project not still wide open to copyright infringement claims from abroad?
As far as I'm aware there are no fair use (or 'fair dealing' as it is here) provisions in the UK that permit the archiving and distribution of copyrighted works without the permission of the copyright holder.
The CAA is hosted and managed by archive.org; it is reasonable to expect that their lawyers greenlighted the project before hosting it. And for complains they already have a system in place to manage all the DMCA requests that they receive daily.
Also, even if it meets the requirements for fair use in the US, is this project not still wide open to copyright infringement claims from abroad?
As far as I'm aware there are no fair use (or 'fair dealing' as it is here) provisions in the UK that permit the archiving and distribution of copyrighted works without the permission of the copyright holder.