The legendary Chinese seafarer the West overlooks

World history about which I knew nothing! I am hard-pressed to understand why we learned nothing about this in school, including university. Given our active combat was because of China's desired territorial control of neighboring nations during the Cold War when PR had U.S.S.R. and China being adversarial - though not combative, wouldn't it have been in our nation's best interests to provide some background about China - like cultural beliefs, and historic political influence in Asia, also as seafaring merchants in the 1400s?

"The Chinese admiral Zheng He must have made quite the impression when the 300 ships under his command arrived at a new destination. The biggest vessels, known as “treasure ships,” were by some estimates longer than a soccer field. Their rigging was festooned with yellow flags, sails dyed red with henna, hulls painted with huge, elaborate birds. Accompanying them were an array of support boats, including oceangoing stables for horses, aqueous farms for growing bean sprouts to keep scurvy away, and water taxis for local transportation. The 15th century citizens who received him in what are now Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, India, Kenya, and Yemen had never seen anything like it.

And that was before the 28,000 inhabitants of Zheng’s ships debarked to establish trade relations with the local government. They came bearing luxuries, from tools (axes, copper basins, porcelain) to cloth (fans, umbrellas, velvet) to food (lychees, raisins, salted meats). In return, they received tribute goods to carry back to China, including spices and precious stones and—on a few notable occasions—ostriches, elephants, and giraffes." [. . .]