Early Life
Williams grew up in Odessa, Texas where he was educated in the public schools of that city. He played on a district championship football team at Permian High School. He attended the University of Texas at Austin from 1962 until 1966, graduating Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. degree and Honors in Government.
As a student at the University of Texas at Austin, he found himself caught up as a potential target during the Tower shootings perpetrated by Charles Whitman on August 1, 1966. Williams, who was driving along Guadalupe Street near the Tower building as the shootings began, personally saved several individuals from harm by his quick actions. His experiences that day later became the subject of an article in the Texas Monthly magazine and in a book about the shootings.
After graduating from the University of Texas, Williams attended what is now the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies of Johns Hopkins University, located in Washington, D.C. He received a Ph.D. from SAIS in 1971. During those years, he also published his first book in 1969 with the Johns Hopkins University Press, The United States, India, and the Bomb.
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