Marten Van Heuven 1932-2022
The Dukakis Center mourns the passing of Marten Van Heuven, retired senior US Foreign Service Officer and former Member of the Dukakis Center Honorary Advisory Board.
Marten Van Heuven was born in Utrecht, and experienced the Nazi occupation of The Netherlands during the Second World War. His family emigrated to the United States in 1947, and he became a naturalized American citizen in due course.
Trained in History and in Law at Yale University, Mr. Van Heuven served as a Legal Advisor at the State Department and then in the Foreign Service as a Europeanist. He was posted in Berlin and Bonn, Brussels, The Hague, Geneva, and Washington, DC. He ended his career in 1989-91 with a stint as National Intelligence Officer on the National Intelligence Council. In this latter capacity he was the principal author of National Intelligence Estimate 15-90 on Yugoslavia, which concluded both that Yugoslavia would dissolve within a year and experience protracted intercommunal violence in certain regions, notably Kosovo, and that the United States and Europe would be unable to preserve Yugoslav unity.
Mr. Van Heuven spoke at the Dukakis Center in November 2004, having collaborated in the Foreign Service with former Anatolia College Richard Jackson. The visit included a Dukakis Lecture and a television appearance on ET3 with the journalist Pantelis Savvidis. Mr. Van Heuven returned to Thessaloniki in May 2008 as keynote speaker at the annual American Studies Seminar co-hosted by the Dukakis Center and the American Consulate General in Thessaloniki.
One of the original Members of the Honorary Advisory Board of the Dukakis Center, Mr. Van Heuven was an assiduous participant in board activities until he stepped down in 2018. Said David Wisner, Executive Director of the Dukakis Center, “Marten Van Heuven was a great friend of Anatolia College and the American College of Thessaloniki, whose mission he fully endorsed. His contribution to the Dukakis Center was exemplary and his service impeccable.”
In addition to his affiliation with the Dukakis Center, Mr. Van Heuven collaborated after retirement with RAND and with the Atlantic Council. He also lectured at the National Foreign Affairs Training Center.
Per his obituary in the Washington Post, “In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to either of two organizations that embrace his personal and professional passions:”
- Razom for Ukraine, Emergency Response (https://www.razomforukraine.org/razom-emergency-response/) which is providing direct humanitarian war relief and recovery aid to Ukraine
- The Green Mountain Hounds (http://greenmountainhounds.com/2016/marten-van-heuven-1932-2022/)
Rest in Peace, Marten.
https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/washingtonpost/name/marten-vanheuven-obituary?id=38593502
