Crony Capitalism Goes Global

William Conway, managing director and co-founder of the Carlyle Group, was talking recently about the media coverage of his bank and the cast of ex-Presidents and former officials, including George H.W. Bush, James Baker III and Frank Carlucci, on its payroll. "One of the words that has recently cropped up as an adjective around us--and I love this adjective--is the 'secretive' Carlyle Group," he said in an interview in his offices overlooking Pennsylvania Avenue in downtown Washington. "What's the secret? I don't think we have many secrets. The reality is, we're a group of businessmen who have made an enormous amount of money for our investors by making good investments over the past fifteen years."

To give Conway his due, Carlyle has done exceedingly well for the 435 pension funds, banks and investment funds--40 percent from overseas--that have entrusted their money to one of the world's largest private equity funds. Under the leadership of Carlucci, a former CIA deputy director who was Defense Secretary in the Reagan Administration, Carlyle has become the nation's eleventh-largest defense contractor, a major arms exporter to Saudi Arabia and Turkey, one of the biggest foreign investors in South Korea and Taiwan, and a key player in global telecommunications, wireless, real estate and healthcare markets.