Originally Posted by
Sotonsean
I wasn't suggesting that LHR was Vietnam Airlines biggest European market. No where in my post did I mention that. And of course I'm totally aware of the fact that Vietnam Airlines serve CDG, A SkyTeam fortress.
Its obvious that your not getting my point.
The point is, why would HAL want to lose a long haul flag carrier to a country unserved by any other airline.
FYI....It's only 290 miles between LHR and CDG, not 400 or so miles.
Plenty of carriers over the years have been “forced” out of Heathrow and some yet returned . As other have said it’s not bilaterals here is simply availability of slots and frankly HAL couldn’t care less for the users of slots or indeed number of carrier's
If they did they would demonstrate that by persuading BA ( IAG) to widen their portfolio beyond the “bazillion” US cities and towns into more of the developing economies ( They can’t as the carrier and parents rightly make there route decision based their own bottom line !)
We are returning to a more normal ACL and slot allocation process.
As for the pedantry on the mileage - pff and just a distracting technique.
The fact is Vietnam aren’t an important carrier especially in the UK market , indeed given there financial condition , retrenching to Paris and allowing AFKL to distribute would probably help their bottom line and reduce the losses.