Restoring wheels to former glory?

If the spokes are stainless steel, then by nature of the material, they will not rust. If they are rusty, then they're probably chrome. You can usually just use a scourer or wire wool on the rust, then autosol... you can get some surprising results with a little elbow grease...

This is what I did to an old Mavic MA wheelset. Polished the rims and hubs with Autosol (hard work, as you have to squeeze through the gaps) and then used wire brush attachment on dremel and a high grade sand paper on spokes; then polished spokes again with Autosol.