Payback (H)

As a reporter for the Christian Science Monitor and later for ABC, Cooley has covered the Middle East and Africa since 1957. His theme in this important book is that during the critical years from the start of the Iranian revolution to the present, the U.S. has been ``paid back'' for its poor judgment and often disastrous policy errors in the Middle East. Cooley puts into context the attacks on the U.S. embassy and Marine barracks in Lebanon, the hijacking of TWA Flight 847, the abductions of the CIA's William Buckley and AP bureau chief Terry Anderson, and other retaliatory acts during what he calls the Khomeini Decade. The book argues that from the end of the Iran-Iraq war in 1988 until Saddam Hussein's 1990 invasion of Kuwait, the Bush administration conducted ``a strange love affair'' with the Iraqi dictator, which climaxed with Desert Storm and its traumatic aftermath. The final payback, according to the author, was the terrible responsibility imposed on the Bush administration by the millions of Kurds fleeing massacre by Saddam's forces. The book is essential reading for its authoritative overview of the Middle East and the recent role of the U.S. in the region. Photos. (Dec.)