Car Bomb Rocks German Arms Firm

IMMENSTAAD, West Germany — A car bomb exploded Friday outside the headquarters of a major defense contractor, shattering hundreds of windows but causing no injuries, authorities said.

Officials said sympathizers of the ultraleftist Red Army Faction terrorist group claimed responsibility for the blast. Police said the terrorist group’s hard-core members were not involved.

The bomb exploded outside the main administration building for research and development at Dornier, a subsidiary of Daimler-Benz. The firm is a major West German defense contractor and aircraft manufacturer.

The blast shattered about 250 windows in the building but caused no injuries, authorities said.

The car bombing was the latest in a series of terrorist attacks on West Germany’s defense industry by left-wing terrorists or their sympathizers, officials said.

Police said they received a warning call four minutes before the attack. Later at the scene, authorities said they found a four-page letter signed by a “fighting unit” of the Baader-Meinhof Gang on stationery marked with the gang’s emblem.

The gang was involved in several terrorist incidents in the 1970s.