Thomas Foley
Thomas Foley is the United States ambassador to Ireland.
Business career
Foley was a business school classmate of George W. Bush.[1]
- Before entering government service, Mr. Foley was in business having worked in New York at McKinsey & Company and then Citicorp Venture Capital before founding NTC Group, a private equity investing business, in 1985. He has over twenty-five years of senior management and private equity investing experience.[2]
Iraq role
- From August, 2003 through March, 2004, Mr. Foley served in Iraq as the Director of Private Sector Development for the Coalition Provisional Authority. Mr. Foley’s responsibilities included overseeing most of Iraq’s 192 state-owned enterprises, stimulating private sector growth, developing foreign trade and investment, and overseeing three state Ministries. Mr. Foley received the Department of Defense Distinguished Public Service Award in June, 2004 for his service in Iraq.[3]
Foley was one of a number of people appointed to roles in Iraq by James O'Beirne and Jerry Jones, who established a reputation for choosing 'Republicans and friends from past and present administrations, some with questionable qualifications."[4]
A week after his arrival in Iraq, Foley reportedly told a contractor from BearingPoint that he intended to privatise all of Iraq's state-owned enterprises within thirty days.
- "Tom, there are a couple of problems with that," the contractor said. "The first is an international law that prevents the sale of assets by an occupation government."
- "I don't care about any of that stuff," Foley told the contractor, according to her recollection of the conversation. "I don't give a shit about international law. I made a commitment to the president that I'd privatise Iraq's businesses."[5]
As head of the Office of Private Sector Development Foley encountered resistance from his own aides and the Coalition Provisional Authority legal department, who told him that early privatisation, who told him that early privatisation would breach article 55 of the Hague Convention of 1899. Iraqi Ministers were also opposed and Foley found little interest among his friends on Wall Street. The announcement on 15 November 2003, of an early return of Iraqi sovereignty eventually scuppered the privatisation plan. Foley reluctantly agreed to a proposal from a BearingPoint contractor to lease factories instead of selling them, but this also drew little interest.[6]
Foley ordered the closure of the Baghdad stock exchange on the advice of specialist Thomas Wirges and subsequently placed Jay Hallen in charge of re-opening it.[7]
Paul Bremer eventually concluded that Foley was the wrong man for the job, but was 'untouchable' as a friend of the President. Eventually Foley was appointed to a new role travelling the role with former Secretary of State James Baker persuading other countries to forgive Iraq's debts.[8]According to T. Christian Miller, Foley's effort to privatise the Iraqi ecxonomy was widley regarded as a failure.[9]
Affiliations
- New Atlantic Initiative International Advisory Board
Connections
References
- ↑ Blood Money, by T. Christian Miller, Black Bay Books, 2007, p.38.
- ↑ United States Ambassador to Ireland: Thomas C. Foley, US Embassy, Dublin, Ireland, accessed 27 October 2008.
- ↑ United States Ambassador to Ireland: Thomas C. Foley, US Embassy, Dublin, Ireland, accessed 27 October 2008.
- ↑ Blood Money, by T. Christian Miller, Black Bay Books, 2007, p.38.
- ↑ Imperial Life in the Emerald City, by Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Bloomsbury, 2008, p.140.
- ↑ Imperial Life in the Emerald City, by Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Bloomsbury, 2008, p.250-251.
- ↑ Imperial Life in the Emerald City, by Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Bloomsbury, 2008, pp.106-108.
- ↑ Imperial Life in the Emerald City, by Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Bloomsbury, 2008, p.251.
- ↑ Blood Money, by T. Christian Miller, Black Bay Books, 2007, p.38.
