UPDATED**So WHY did our Gov deny Venezuelan President Maduro airspace access for China trip????

[dixiegrrrrl]

Last edited Fri Sep 20, 2013, 01:39 PM - Edit history (1)

CARACAS, Venezuela: Venezuelan foreign minister Elias Jaua says that the United States has prohibited a planned flight by President Nicolas Maduro from passing through US airspace over Puerto Rico.

Jaua said on Thursday that the flight had been scheduled to pass over the US territory on Friday on its way to China. He characterized the US action as an "aggression."

The US Embassy in Caracas did not immediately respond to a request seeking comment on the foreign minister's statement. Maduro is leaving Friday for the trip to China, which runs through Tuesday.

Venezuela and the US have had tense relations for a number of years and have been without ambassadors in each other's country since 2010.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/rest-of-world/US-denies-President-Nicolas-Maduro-airspace-access-for-China-trip-Venezuela/articleshow/22781094.cms

Jeez, every time our gov has the choice between acting like a buffoon or with some grace, the buffoon wins out.

UPDATE:
Update: US approves last-minute flight plan for Venezuelan officials, State Department says

[Jenoch]

1. Who is the navigator on that flight, Howard Borden?

[HooptieWagon]

4. No doubt its a great circle route, the shortest distance.

And there may be a refueling stop in Hawaii.

[Jenoch]

8. Yeah, I thought of that after I wrote the post.

However, with the distances involved, changing the route a couple of degrees should not be a big deal. I think the Snowden thing is why the state department refused to allow the original route.

[joshcryer]

14. It would have to fly over Maine, too, which would be non-trivial.

http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=CCS-PEK&MS=wls&MP=a&DU=mi

I don't understand this to be honest. It's nearly 9,000 miles.

Maduro has an Airbus A-319, its range is 4,257 miles, it's simply not going to be able to take that route. You'd need a different plane to pull that off.

[Jenoch]

16. I find that route app interesting.

Is it possible there was to be a refueling stop in Canada?

After looking at the map again, it appears the route is east of Maine.

[joshcryer]

17. Halfway mark would be basically nothing there.

I don't even think there's a place on Baffin Island to refuel. So it's a no-go in Maduro's plane. There are of course other planes that could make the trip, the Boeing 777 for instance.

Anyway if you switch the view to rectangular you can see it actually flies straight over Maine: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=CCS-PEK&MS=wls&MP=r&DU=mi

I should say this would be a good route if you had the plane that could make it, what was unusual to me was that Maduro's plane can't make it going that way, so he'd have to get a different plane to do it (then again it's also possible his plane is modified and has more fuel).

[HooptieWagon]

24. Wouldn't it be possible to refuel in Russia or Iceland?

[joshcryer]

29. Not on that route.

Look at a map. Nothing there at the halfway point. They need to use a different plane.

[HooptieWagon]

33. You don't have to refuel at halfway point...

since distance is 4900 and range is 4200. You only have to refuel between mile 1000 and 4000 (plus figure in a safety factor). And deviating from great circle route is no big deal...often done for weather reasons anyway. It appears that plane could refuel in Canada, Iceland, or Russia. Possibly Finland. I don't know if Greenland has commercial airport that will handle a large jet.

[pa28]

6. Seems hard to believe but that's the route you would take.

Straight over the pole to China.

[Historic NY]

2. Wait a minute........

http://pininthemap.com/ppf07dfa10cdc53d3c4

China isn't this way.

[Chan790]

3. I don't have a problem with this.

Nicolás Maduro, more than even his predecessor, has been aggressively hostile towards the United States. We can and should do everything we can to render that hostility as uncomfortable for him as possible. People who declare themselves our enemy deserve no grace.

[HooptieWagon]

5. Which is why Obama keeps drawing blanks trying to assemble a coalitiion

Why the hell would any head of state give him the benefit of doubt?
The problem is Obama throws everyone of no immediate use to him under the bus. Then, when he needs their help, its only natural to give him the finger. Liberals/progressives already have it figured out.

[Chan790]

11. In Maduro's case that's not even close to an accurate analogy.

It's more like he laid down underneath the bus as soon as Chavez was dead and started hollering of being rundown by the evil imperial Americans. He's a joke, one that deserves neither respect nor credibility.

He should go back to ranting on state TV about the multiplication of penises by Jesus (yes, he really did this during a speech; conflating the Spanish word "peces" with "penes".) and drunkenly falling off his bike. (Yes, he did this too.)

[HooptieWagon]

13. Look, no matter if he's loony tune or not...

A simple courtesy of granting over-flight to a head of state is a no-brainer. Obama's ego is overriding common sense. His karma is catching up with him...no foreign country will work with him. Hell, not even England is a lead-pipe cinch now. What does that tell you? All that goodwill from 4 years ago went up in smoke with the bridges he burned.

[Recursion]

23. Do you actually know we didn't?

Because his government says so?

[HooptieWagon]

25. Like Obama admin is truthful?

[nadinbrzezinski]

18. Read the Vienna convention.

[sabrina 1]

31. Maybe you should study a little bit of the history of US policies towards Latin America

to understand why that entire region deserves an APOLOGY for the decades of suffering under US Backed Dictators like Pinochet, the torture school run right here in the US to help train Dictator Torturers which was very effective.

The ME will one day become what Latin America has finally become, free, independent of Western Colonial Influence.

After the attempt coup back in 2002 of Chavez it was clear that the US was not going to give up its past behavior of installing unwanted, puppet leaders, like Pinochet or helping to topple duly elected leaders and decided it was time for all those oppressed countries to take back their sovereignty and protect their OWN RESOURCES from Global Cartels.

We are in NO position to do anything regarding any democratic leader of a Latin American country other than APOLOGIZE for the role we played in the horrific past crimes committed against them. Henry Kissinger, Death Squads, disappearances, etc all now finally being dealt with as several countries are bringing OUR FORMER ALLIES, the torturers, the murderers, to justice.

We have lost our influence in Latin America but our reaction to their freedom from oppressive puppet dictators demonstrates that WE have not changed our criminal ways and are still trying to re-capture that horrible humans rights abusive past so that we can control, once again, their RESOURCES.

This is the second time the US has insulted a democratically elected leader of a Latin American country.

And it is STUPID. The US has managed to entice some economic interactions with Argentina and Chile eg, but after the NSA spying scandal and the INSULT to Morales, they are no longer willing to trust the US.

Chavez did great work for Latin America to protect the region from a return to the US backed Dictator policies when he created THEIR version of NATO. Now the West can no longer deal with on little country at a time. An insult to ONE of the member states, is an insult to all.

And that is why the West hates Morales and Chavez and Morales and any Latin American leader who believes the own their own resources. That they are NOT sitting on OUR OIL.

This action is petty, stupid, and will have even more negative results for the US piled on all the other childish, silly insults, like a misbehaving child throwing a temper tantrum.

And our policies in the ME will one day have the same effect as those countries, like Latin America decide that THEIR resources also belong to THEM.

Stupid, childish, temper tantrum throwing nonsense only serves to diminish this country's reputation even more in the eyes of the world.

[Hissyspit]

15. Nonsense.

[Cleita]

7. Probably because Maduro offered Snowden asylum.

I guess our govt. is going to be hard assed about this. I wish it stopped. It just fuels the belief in American imperialism in South America.

[quinnox]

9. The Obama administration threw a temper tantrum and did embarrassing things

just a few months ago over the Snowden affair, grounding a foreign countries president's plane. This is obviously a continuation of that temper tantrum. Several duers (the hard core fan club members) also seemed to be reality-challenged during this prior incident, and refused to believe it was happening by posting nonsense constantly, showing just how much in denial they were.

[nadinbrzezinski]

19. Waiting for that Moscow street map

[SidDithers]

10. "Venezuelan foreign minister Elias Jaua says"...

any confirmation from someone not attached to the Venezuelan government?

Sid

[tritsofme]

12. Maduro is a dingbat.

Anything that comes out of his mouth is suspect, but I don't particularly care if it is true.

[backscatter712]

20. And again, the U.S. shows itself to be the George Zimmerman of the world stage. n/t

[geek tragedy]

27. That is a really stupid thing to say.

1) it may not be true that he was denied airspace rights; (2) nobody was even injured, merely inconvenienced at worst.

[woo me with science]

30. +1

Winning hearts and minds.

[Common Sense Party]

21. What makes you think that the U.S. actually denied the airspace?

Just because the Venezuelan foreign minister said so?

I would take this with a HUGE grain of salt until I se some actual proof.

Saying something doesn't make it true.

[woo me with science]

22. Well, obviously

it was another fuel gauge problem.

See right here:

[Eugene]

26. U.S. allows Venezuelan officials to fly over United States

Source: Reuters

U.S. allows Venezuelan officials to fly over United States

WASHINGTON | Fri Sep 20, 2013 9:39am EDT

(Reuters) - The United States approved a last-minute flight plan for Venezuelan officials, the State Department said on Friday in a move that allowed Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to fly over Puerto Rico on his way to China.

Washington told Venezuela Thursday night that permission was granted even though the request had not been properly submitted, State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said.

[font size=1]-snip-[/font]

Earlier in the day, Caracas said the United States had banned Maduro's jet from flying through U.S. airspace en route to a state visit in China this weekend, calling it an act of aggression.

Harf said Venezuela did not follow proper steps in its flyover request, giving just one day's notice instead of the required three.

[font size=1]-snip-[/font]

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/20/us-venezuela-usa-overflight-idUSBRE98J0G320130920

[joshcryer]

28. So, they wanted one days notice when the requirement is three days.

In other words Venezuela is a whiny kid that wanted its way by submitting a request outside of the system, it gets denied automatically, and the US goes out of its way to accept the request.

Pathetic.

Harf said the request for diplomatic clearance for the aircraft -- which she said was not a state aircraft as required for such clearance -- to enter the airspace with just a day's notice.

"Diplomatic flight clearances are required to be made with three days advance notice," she said.

"We advised Venezuela on the correct way to get the clearance and notified their authorities last night that permission was granted," she said.

You got to think Venezuela did this on purpose just to cause an "incident." Hoping no one would notice, hoping no one would care that they were being petulant.

[tammywammy]

32. "You got to think Venezuela did this on purpose just to cause an "incident.""

Yes.

[Common Sense Party]

34. So, as I suspected, this was more caca del toro from Maduro and his anti-U.S. cronies.

BTW, in case you're keeping score at home: Maduro is the buffoon here.