Dental schools adhere to the highest standard of treatment for a variety of ethical and legal reasons. So I doubt that they misled you in any way. But remember, you said that they said that you MIGHT need surgery.
That leaves a lot of wiggle room b/t your ortho saying you don't need surgery and needing it. If you have doubts, get another opinion.
I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.