rduarte,
You are indeed factually correct, although it is widely accepted that the majority of International flights in Europe are generally handled in English, and ICAO are trying to implement this throughout its member states.(SEE BELOW)
There are many good reasons why a standard language for pilots should apply, and as already said, English is already widely accepted as that language. Accidents such as:
Tenerife, March 1977 As a KLM 747 started its take off from Tenerife airport, air traffic control (ATC) gave instructions for its flight path. The pilot misunderstood the instructions and thought he had received clearance. His response included "we are now at take off". This was in turn misunderstood by ATC, and the KLM 747 collided with a Pan American 747 still on the runway.
New York, US, January 1990 An Avianca Boeing 707 en route from Medellin in Colombia to New York's JFK airport was put into a holding pattern while awaiting permission to land. The plane was low on fuel but the crew was unable to communicate the urgency of the low fuel situation to ATC. Due to bad weather the crew had to abort an attempted landing and soon afterwards fuel ran out. The plane crashed into woods killing 73 out of 158 passengers and crew.
Cali, Colombia, December 1995 An American Airlines plane, travelling from Miami, crashed into a mountain while descending into Cali, Colombia, killing 163 passengers and crew. The air traffic controller told investigators he knew information given by the flight crew was inconsistent with the instructions he had issued. If the controller had shared a common language with the pilot he would have been able to seek clarification from the crew.
may have been prevented if a standard language was adopted.
Hopefully countries such as France will one day adopt a united language. Air France, did try to impose an English-only policy at Charles de Gaulle airport, following an accident in 2000. Air France had had long-standing concerns about confusion of French and English air traffic control instructions at the airport, but in spite of these, the initiative was abandoned after a few weeks in the face of national opposition.
Behind this reticence is an admission that many countries will view this as a first step to English being made the mandatory language for all ground-to-air communication. The ICAO has so far avoided confrontation over a single language by adhering to a very vague convention. This recommends that English should be used as the default language only if communication cannot be conducted in the language normally used by the ground station.
BUT THINGS ARE ABOUT TO CHANGE:
http://www.rmitenglishworldwide.com/icao.html
"In September 2003 the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), a division within the United Nations, announced changes to provisions strengthening language proficiency requirements. These requirements will come into effect from March 2008. These changes mean that for the first time, all pilots operating on international routes and all air traffic controllers who communicate with foreign pilots will need to have their English language proficiency formally assessed. The ICAO language proficiency requirement requires that pilots and air traffic controllers be able to communicate proficiently using both ICAO phraseology (ICAO Doc. 9832) and plain English (ICAO Doc. 9835)."
The tide is turning!
