Malaysian officials change their story again on the course of missing plane

USA Today:

Malaysian officials are backing away from assertions that the missing Malaysian Airlines flight made it to the Strait of Malacca after turning away from its intended course.

The country's air force chief said in a statement issued Wednesday here that the missing Boeing 777 may have attempted to turn back before it vanished from radar, but that there is no evidence it reached the Strait of Malacca off the western coast of Malaysia.

Gen. Rodzali Daud denied remarks reported by a Malaysian newspaper that he had asserted otherwise, based on military radar tracking.

Meantime, the country's civilian aviation chief, Azharuddin Abdul Rahman, said he could neither confirm nor deny the military's earlier reported remarks, that military radar had tracked the plane as it turned directions and flew in a western direction after ending active transponder transmissions.

The developments contributed to what appeared to be a state of confusion at the highest levels of that country over where the plane might be and deepeneed the mystery of what happened to flight MH370. There were 239 people aboard, including a crew of 12, on a flight to Beijing.

"There is a possibility of an air turn back. We are still investigating and looking at the radar readings," Rahman said.

Malaysia's military said Tuesday that a missing jet was hundreds of miles off course an hour after it vanished from civilian radar, deepening the mystery of what happened to the flight with 239 people aboard.

Gen. Rodzali Daud told Malaysia's Berita Harian newspaper that military radar picked up the location of the Boeing 777 several hundred miles to the west of its intended flight path to Beijing.
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There is not much here to give you confidence in Malaysia's air traffic controllers or their military radar technicians.   They seem confused at all turns.  If the plane turned as the military suggested, why didn't they respond to that movement by trying to contact the plane or sending up their own planes to see what was going on?

One reason they have not found the plane is because they have no idea where to look, because their air control system appears to be incompetent.