I wonder. Does Terrance J. Wilkinson sound like Joseph C. Wilson to you? The claims and the manner of speaking? The tone is different than the one that Wilson adopted in his writing, but when he's worked himself into high dudgeon on the air, it sure sounds a lot like Terrance J. Wilkinson.
Joe Wilson? Or a close co-conspirator? It sounds like a test run for the op-ed, doesn't it? How much can I get away with, how far can I go?
Funny, too, how this ended up down the memory hole. It got swamped by the op-ed, sure. But nobody ever seemed to pick up on the association.
In 1982, while I was working for Congressman Manuel Lujan of New Mexico, a man came up to a me during a gathering in Albuquerque and introduced himself as Terrance J. Wilkinson. He said he was a security consultant and gave me a business card with his name and just a Los Angeles phone number.
A few weeks later, he called my Washington office and asked to meet for lunch. He seemed to know a lot about the nuclear labs in New Mexico and said he had conducted "security profiles" for both Los Alamos and Sandia National Labs.
This sounds like Wilkinson was active in New Mexico in 1982 and thereabouts. Wilson would've been in Africa at that time. I haven't heard anything about him being familiar with nuclear labs, either, so I tend to think it's someone else.
However this does suggest to me that "Wilkinson" might be someone tied to a spy ring at Los Alamos in the early 80s, which might be a clue.