 Carney began his Foreign Service Officer career in Vietnam in 1967 as a rotation officer based in Saigon for biographic and youth affairs and for commercial matters.He was then stationed in Lesotho as second of two officers in charge of consular, political and economic affairs until 1971.In 1972, he was appointed Second Secretary at the U.S. Mission in Phnom Penh, before returning to the United States to study at Cornell University in 1975.