Covert City

The Cold War and the Making of Miami

By: Vince Houghton, Eric Driggs

Narrated by: Eric Driggs, Vince Houghton

Secret operations, corruption, crime, and a city teeming with spies: why Miami was as crucial to winning the Cold War as Washington, DC, or Moscow.

The Cuban Missile Crisis was perhaps the most dramatic and dangerous period of the Cold War. What's less well known is that the city of Miami, mere miles away, was a pivotal, though less well known, part of Cold War history. With its population of Communist exiles from Cuba, its strategic value for military operations, and its lax business laws, Miami was an ideal environment for espionage.

Covert City tells the history of how the entire city of Miami was constructed in the image of the US-Cuba rivalry. From the Bay of Pigs invasion to the death of Fidel Castro, the book shows how Miami is a hub for money and cocaine but also secrets and ideologies. Cuban exiles built criminal and political organizations in the city, leading Washington to set up a CIA station there, codenamed JMWAVE. It monitored gang activities, plotted secret operations against Castro, and became a base for surveilling Latin American neighbors. The money and infrastructure built for the CIA was integral to the development of Miami.

Covert City is a sweeping and entertaining history, full of stunning experimental operations and colorful characters—a story of a place like no other.

©2024 Vince Houghton and Eric Driggs (P)2024 PublicAffairs

Entertaining history to understand Cuban exiles

My generation grew up hearing some wild stories about Cuba before, during, and after the revolucion. Personally, this book confirmed a couple of them. There's a handful of entertaining books that deal with the history of the Cuban revolution from the outsiders perspective; like TJ English books on the American mob in Cuba and the CIA-trained Cuban exile mafia, as well as Annie Jacobsen book on CIA paramilitary operations. This book belongs right beside them as it beautifully describes the local mythos which still drives the political psychology of most Cuban exile boomers living in the USA, and is very well researched without becoming boring and academic. Worth the read.

A good overview about Miami history

I should start by saying I am a native Floridian that lived and recalled many of the chapters in this book. Saying that, I believe this to be a good primer for younger readers that are studying the Cold War and Cubans that came to Miami in the early 60s. I also believe this to be a vanilla treatment of much of the darker side of Miami during the same period. This was touched on more in the last chapters but escaped from recounting how crime masked freedom fighting and conversely how freedom fighting complimented crime when Miami was the murder capital of the US. Nonetheless this work should be required reading for students of cold War history regardless of their profession. Well done to the authors.

The final chapter

Interesting historical account of Miami. Kind of hard to follow at some points but overall good.

List to this

The book is not only fascinating, but very unbiased. As a Cuban American, who lives in South Florida, I can appreciate all angles told about my great community. You could literally write multiple movie scripts and documentaries from every chapter.

A fun and interesting telling of Miami’s historical relevance and place in the world.

This book is a must read for anyone looking to learn about Miami’s history and its relevance to world affairs. It is a fun and interesting telling of world events from the eyes of Miami.

American Propaganda

(This is probably not a great review, but then this is not a great book, so…). As somebody looking in from the outside, this appears to be little more than American propaganda. But it's interesting how impossible it appears to be for the authors to imagine that there might be others in the world who truly believe that Castro was in the right (they call some Cubans who chose to stay behind and supported Castro 'brainwashed' at one point, blithely oblivious that readers might think similarly about them).

Ruined the ending with unnecessary anti Trump comments

As a Miami resident with direct ties to a lot of what was covered I enjoyed the content, but the unnecessary and incorrect accusations about President Trump soured my experience, why interject personal politics into this conversation.