I was wrong. I look into it again and...
Naryv has stated it correctly!!
What one needs to do is actually "Create" a plane within 20-25 Km to be able to select one of the other spawned planes in the main briefing area.
It is actually pretty cool if you have MAP ICONS enabled. You can click on the planes right on the map and a red circle appears on them and you are ready to BE that plane.
In short, you need to be inside the actual map first, then hit ESC to get back into the briefing screen and THEN you can select planes that are within 20-25 km radius.
Very very cool situation here.
I apologize if this is old new already!