<human>: Can you succinctly summarize the text in 1-3 sentences?

I was born in the early 80's, so I am not going to try to understand what it was like to live under the threat of M.A.D. (Mutually Assured Destruction).  I do remember my dad calling my brother and I into the living room, pointing to the tv, and trying to tell us what it meant when the people on tv were tearing down a wall.  As I have gotten older I have come to understand what a significant impact the Cold War has had on the world.  I can not begin to list the countries that are still paying the price for that "conflict", and come to think of it I don't think I can list one country that hasn't been impacted.  To get back to my question, how is it possible that a public school student has no idea about the Cold War beyond "Russia" (note not U.S.S.R.) and the US were not friendly.  What kind of a failure is the public school system if this is possible?  I am not saying that teachers aren't doing their job, I am just curious how something like this gets left out of a high school curriculum.  Sorry for the wall of text.
<bot>: How is it that a decent student has no idea about the impact of the Cold War on the world?  What has gone wrong with the US public school system?