Gone With the Wintex

Bonn's embarrassing reputation of being the leakiest capital in Europe inevitably provokes a certain sympathy from security-minded government officials everywhere. West Germany's state secrets are stolen with benumbing regularity by one or another of the country's estimated 16,000 foreign agents, while other bits of classified information have a way of turning up in the headlines of the nation's newspapers and flashy illustrateds. Until last week, however, nobody could recall a case in Bonn--or anywhere else, for that matter--in which a foreign power was thoughtful enough to return a set of secret files to the country from which it had been stolen.

According to the West German Press Agency, the Foreign Ministry in Bonn this month received an unexpected package by messenger from the Soviet embassy--along with a note signed "with sincere regards" by the Soviet ambassador. Incredibly, the package contained the original top-secret files on the forthcoming NATO-wide exercises, known as Wintex 73, which are designed to test the political and civilian emergency measures to be taken by NATO powers in the event of war. The files are believed to deal with everything from how to set up a temporary parliament in a bunker near Bonn to the distribution of food supplies.

Neither the Soviet embassy nor the Bonn government cared to comment on the report. "It's a secret matter," said one Foreign Ministry spokesman optimistically.

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