Yes, it took a years, so what? Poland showed the way for all of the USSR satellite states and was instrumental in the collapse of the union. I know that America likes to take credit for this through their financing and support of Afghanistan during the Russian-Afghan war but I am pretty sure that that does not properly credit all of the players.

The protests gave you martial law and the lost decade, but they also gave you the foundation of what came after: the best performing ex sovbloc country. I'm sure proximity to Germany helped here, a lot of money got dumped into Poland but at the same time Poland worked extremely hard to get where it is today. And without those protests all that might have never happened, or it might have happened much later.

> I also hope for a big change in Russia after some revolution, but it is not that simple under a strict dictatorship.

This is true, and Russia has far bigger problems than Poland had, in spite of being plundered for decades. I'm under no illusion that such a process would be either quick or easy.