Bill Martin

Bill Martin

Personal & Mission Statement

Williams (“Bill”) is a retired U.S. diplomat, fluent in German, who most recently worked with the European foreign press corps, including the German press corps, in Washington.

His time at the State Department included a year as the spokesperson of the U.S. Embassy in Berlin in 2017-18, a short stint as a senior advisor on the Germany Desk, and two years as the Austria Desk Officer. He spent most of his career as a political officer and later as a public diplomacy officer working on European and South Asian issues. 

In 2014-2015, as a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, Bill organized a “next generation” report to strengthen U.S.-German relations, to include selecting the six young German and six young American fellows to write it. In 2004-2005, he was a foreign affairs fellow for U.S. Senator John E. Sununu (R-NH). 

Before joining State, Bill worked for two years as an associate for a law firm in New York City — Walter, Conston, Alexander & Green — that specialized in German business. He has a master’s degree in international relations from Johns Hopkins University SAIS, a law degree from Vanderbilt University, and a bachelor’s degree in history and German from Duke University. His junior year in college, he studied at the Philipps-Universität in Marburg, W. Germany.  While in school, Bill also lived for two summers with German families in the Black Forest and Bavaria. He began learning German as a teenager when his father was posted to Frankfurt am Main with the U.S. Army. 

He will contribute to GAHF by assisting in strengthening the foundation’s engagement with the U.S. government, foreign embassies, think tanks, and other foreign policy organizations and its outreach via creative programming and messaging to young Americans and Germans (and Austrians) interested in the U.S.-German (and U.S.-Austrian) relationship and legacy. Bill will gladly  support any projects or committees where his skills and connections can be useful.

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