This Story Has Never Been Told. It starts in pre-1959 Miami and ends with the 2000 Gore/Bush presidential election. A story of intrigue carried out in Havana and Washington, as well as in Panama, Nassau, Kingston, Cuernavaca, Mexico City, New York, and Atlanta, Secret Missions to Cuba is a powerful expose of the intimidating influence that militant Cuban exiles have had, and its enormous consequences for Cuban Americans.

The key to exploring exile politics in Florida is Bernardo Benes, a Cuban American lawyer who made dozens of trips to Cuba to meet with Fidel Castro during the Carter and Reagan administrations. Benes's first mission in 1978 led to the release of 3,600 political prisoners and enabled exiled Cubans to visit their relatives. He operated in an atmosphere of intimidation so strong that those not adhering to exile community pressures were branded Castro agents, or worse. The personal consequences for Benes were severe: He became -- and remains to this day -- an outcast in Miami's Cuban community for having dealt personally with Castro.

"As a reporter who covered Miami during the time these events took place, I wish I knew then what this book reveals now. Truth is truly stranger than fiction," notes best-selling writer Edna Buchanan, who won the Pulitzer Prize for crime reporting while at the Miami Herald.

In 2000, anti-Castro rancor in Miami fueled an intense dispute between Cuban Americans and their neighbors over Elian Gonzalez. The anti-government backlash meant that even more Cuban Americans than usual voted for the Republican Party in the remarkably narrow presidential election.

This groundbreaking book by Latin American specialist Robert M. Levine is about the shaping of American foreign policy, Cuban-American relations, and the United States's hidden history with Cuba. For the first time ever, read the full story -- and witness the tensions, volatility, and paradoxes inherent to Cuban Miami.