I grew up in another time.

The world was not safe back then.

We constantly lived with the threat of war.

We were taught to be afraid of Russia and the evil Communist Empire behind the “Iron Curtain.”

In school, Shelter Drills were as common as Fire Drills. We would get under our desks and cover our heads to protect ourselves from an attack from the air. We would sit in the hallway away from windows so that the shattering glass from the bomb blasts wouldn’t hurt us.

Those who were most afraid – or best prepared – built underground shelters to flee to, live in and survive just in case of the worst-case scenario.

We were a nation at war – a Cold War.

Nary a shot was fired. I can’t recall a life being lost. As far as wars go, the Cold War was a fizzle.

Sure there were the moments. There was Nikita Khrushchev flipping out at the UN pounding his shoe on the desk. There was his memorable threat: “We will bury you!” Sure there was the Cuban Missile Crisis where President Kennedy stared down a Soviet attempt to bring missiles just 90 miles from our shore. There was the U2 incident when an American spy plane was downed behind the Curtain and pilot Gary Powers taken prisoner.

There was espionage. There were agents, double agents and guys who presumably “led three lives.” There were movies and television shows.

They were scary times. We were at war.

Then the decades-long face off of the world’s two great superpowers ended. The iron curtain fell. The Soviet Union broke up. In Germany, they tore down “that wall.” They deposed the despots. Countries changed names.

Democracy broke out.

And just like that, the Cold War was over.

We were left as the only world’s great superpower.

The arms race was over.

Peace broke out.

And slowly we realized that the world was different. We were raising our children not to live in fear. We were giving to them the gift of peace.

I remember it well.

My daughter was born on July 27, 1989. The Iron Curtain was clearly no longer iron. Mikhail Gorbachev’s perestroika was infectious. The “evil empire” was disintegrating and by October of that year, the Eastern Bloc stopped blocking. People began to move freely and by the end of November of 1989, the Berlin War – the symbol of the iron curtain since the end of the World War – came down. East met West in peace.

My daughter and her generation were to grow up in a world I never knew — a world which would study war no more.

And then, shortly after her 12th birthday on Sept. 11, 2001, I revisited that thought.

And now just a short while after her 17th birthday – right after the arrest of some two dozen apparently fanatical Muslims planning to use liquid explosives on flights from Great Britain to the United States, and in the middle of the war between Israel and Hezbollah – I realize her world, her generation’s world, is the one filled with fear.

Being the world’s great superpower has not done much for us. The Iron Curtain was a symbolic enemy that didn’t fire guns. National or ideological pride was not enough to cause death.

Today there is more.

In the name of religion, my little girl’s world is a dangerous one. People are dying. People are killing themselves. People are killing others. Fanatical Islamic terrorists have changed the paradigm of war.

And we do not know how to fight back.

Our government is less able to protect our citizens today, than any other time in my life.

What will be our legacy to the children?

It is time for a change.

Michael Schenkler can be reached via this contact form.