West Germany the Counterspy Who Was a Spy

By EDWARD W. DESMOND

Hans Joachim Tiedge, 48, a top West German counterintelligence officer, had a drinking problem, and colleagues said he was still depressed over his wife's death three years ago. So no one in his office was surprised last Monday morning when Tiedge called in sick. But he did not respond to phone calls and, on Wednesday, his daughters reported him missing to the police. Even then, Tiedge's employers clung to the possibility that his personal problems might have driven him to suicide. It turned out to be wishful thinking. Last Friday at 10:25 a.m., under the heading of the official East German news agency A.D.N., the answer to the spy catcher's whereabouts rattled out on newspaper- office teletypes: "Hans Joachim Tiedge has crossed to the German Democratic Republic and asked for asylum."

Tiedge's defection to East Germany is probably only the beginning of West Germany's worst espionage scandal in a decade. For four years he directed the country's efforts to track, foil and capture East German spies. That background will be invaluable to spymasters in East Germany, who run an estimated 3,000 agents in West Germany alone. Says Hans Neusel, State Secretary for the Interior Ministry: "If Tiedge passes on all his knowledge, this will mean immense damage for West Germany's intelligence work." West German authorities believe that he may have helped East German spies evade detection. Police are still searching for three suspected East German agents, one of them the personal secretary to a West German government minister, who vanished earlier this month, possibly on Tiedge's cue.

Trying to limit the damage, the government of Chancellor Helmut Kohl notified NATO allies of the security breach, while the Interior Ministry began an investigation. So far, politicians have refrained from blaming Kohl, and his government does not appear to be in immediate political danger. Gerhard Jahn, a member of parliament from the opposition Social Democratic Party, deplored the defection but added that he believed the government "doesn't want to hide anything."

For West Germans, the unanswered question was why Tiedge betrayed his country. By all accounts he was a diligent civil servant. He had served the Cologne-based spy-catching unit, formally called the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, for 19 years, the last four of them as head of the department dealing with East German spies. But after his wife died, his life began to go to pieces.

Overweight and diabetic, Tiedge began drinking too much. His three teenage daughters frequently found themselves fatherless in the family's one-story white stucco bungalow in Cologne. Tiedge's superiors knew about his problems, but they feared that switching him to another job might push him over the edge. But by that point, he may already have gone over. Among Tiedge's contacts may have been the three suspected East German agents who recently vanished. Sonja Luneburg, 61, longtime personal secretary to Economics Minister Martin Bangemann, and Ursula Richter, 52, a bookkeeper for a lobbying group, each disappeared while on vacation this month. A search of the women's modest apartments in Bonn revealed spy paraphernalia such as specialized photographic equipment and a briefcase with a hidden compartment. Lorenz Betzing, 53, a messenger for the West German armed forces' administrative office in Bonn and a close friend of Richter's, vanished last Monday. All three are now thought to be in East Germany.

Of the three, only Luneburg had access to high levels of the West German government, but the others may have done considerable damage as well. Richter, who was already under surveillance by Tiedge's department, is thought to have worked as a control for other East German agents. One of those may have been Betzing. A onetime air-condition- ing repairman at the government's secret wartime operations bunker in the Ahr valley near Bonn, he would have had access to the layout and operations of the facility.

Luneburg was Bangemann's trusted secretary for twelve years. Before taking the economics post last year, Bangemann had been a key figure in the leadership of the Free Democratic Party, the minority coalition member in every West German government since 1969. That meant that Luneburg was privy to inside information on party politics and government deliberations. But Bangemann's new job may have netted Luneburg an additional prize. As a Cabinet member, he held a seat on the Federal Security Council, a top consultative body that deliberates on West German defense affairs. Bangemann insists, however, that Luneburg was not involved in council matters.

The rotund secretary, her gray hair in a grandmotherly bob, apparently infiltrated the country by taking the name of a West Berlin woman who had moved to France. West German officials say that photographs taken at the time show conclusively that the spy and the real Luneburg are different people. When Luneburg underwent a security check last year, she conveniently forgot to include a picture of herself.

Espionage rivalry between the two Germanys has long been intense. Last year 24 suspected East German agents were arrested in West Germany, and 18 were convicted on espionage charges. For Bonn, the week's events add up to the most serious spy scandal since 1974, when then Chancellor Willy Brandt resigned after an aide, Gunter Guillaume, was arrested on charges of being an East German agent. Says Richard Meier, former head of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution: "It is a catastrophe that can set us back years."

With reporting by Robert Ball/Bonn