波兰领土、人口、历史都不差，为何近代以来没有成为欧洲大国？
Hey. I'm from Poland so I can answer - I think - very good. So everything started like 300 years ago. Our system was the noble democracy - it means when we had to make some important decision, only the richest people could vote. King had almost nothing to say. Why was it so bad? Because we also had a rule called: "liberum veto": it means, if there is some election, then one person can just say 'liberum veto' and then whole election is void. The idea of liberum veto was, that if most of nobles are corrupted, then there can be the one not corrupted, that can make a non-good decision for Poland void. But the reality was different. We had corrupted nobles (Russia and Germany were paying them) that were making good decisions for Poland void. It meant, our country is just not possible to make any good decision, so it cannot work as a normal country. Also we had the problem, that nobles were totally rich, and normal people were completely poor. They didn't want to fight for our country since it gives them back nothing. 你好，我来自波兰所以我自认为可以很好的回答这个问题。 一切都开始于三百年前，我们的体制是崇高的民主制-意味着当我们要做出重大决定时，只有有钱人才能投票。国王几乎没有发言权。为什么这么糟糕呢？因为我们有个规定叫做“自由否决权”：意思是如果有一些选举活动,这时有一个人就说“自由否决权”，那么整个选举就作废了。整个自由否决权的意义在于，如果大部分权贵人士都很腐败，那么就算只有一个人不腐败，那都可以避免任何对于波兰不好的决定。但现实是残酷的，我们有腐败的权贵人士（俄罗斯人和德国人收买他们）使得益于波兰的政策作废。换句话说，我们国家就没有什么好的政策，因为这个选举都无法像正常国家那样进行，同时我们还有个问题就是贫富差距太大，穷人也懒得为国家斗争因为他们觉得没有回报可言。 And imagine what could happen, when country like that was attacked by Germans, Russians and Austria at the same time. We lost our independence for 123 years. During these 123 years people had bad education and were very poor. So Poland was not able to grow for 123 years - that's the one reason why we are not so strong now. Also, we had 3 completely different occupations, so till the day today west side of Poland (German and Austria occupation) is much more civilized than the east part (Russian occupation). 想象一下像这样的国家同时被德国，俄罗斯和奥地利侵略时，会发生什么？我们失去了123年的独立权，在123年期间，人们没有受到良好的教育，经济也差。所以波兰在123年期间没法成长-那也是为什么我们现在不够强大的原因之一。同时，我们被三个国家占领，所以直到今天，波兰的西部（德国和奥地利占领区）都比东部（俄罗斯占领区）文明程度高的多。 So after these 123 years we gained independence only for 20 years: then Germans and Russians attacked us again and world war II began. 123年后我们取得独立，但仅仅保持了20年，德国和俄罗斯再次攻打我们，于是二战开始了。 What really made Poland weak was an incident in Katyn in 1941. Russians (they were saying that Germans did it for the next 40 years) killed about 20.000 of Polish intelligence. There were professors, politicans - the most smart people in Poland. 但使得波兰真正变弱的是发生在1941年的卡廷惨案。俄罗斯人（他们说接下来四十年德国人都那样做）杀了两万名有才智的波兰人。他们是教授，政客-波兰最聪明的人群。 During the war Germans and Russians were taking everything valuable to their countries. Also in 1944 80% of our capital city - Warsaw was destroyed during the Warsaw Uprising. 在这场战斗中，德国人和俄罗斯人把所有波兰有价值的东西带回他们自己的国家。同时在1944年，我们的首都-华沙的80%建筑都在华沙起义中被摧毁。 So after the war Poland had no intelligence, no valuable things and whole Warsaw was destroyed. But the biggest problem was, that the Russian army was still staying in Poland killing its citizens. Our hero - Witold Pilecki, that was in Auschwitz for years said, that Auschwitz was just a fun comparing with Russian jail. 所以战争结束后，波兰失去了人才和有价值的物品，整个华沙也被摧毁了。但最大的问题在于，俄国军队仍然待在波兰滥杀平民。我们的英雄-在奥斯威辛集中营待过多年的维托尔德·皮莱斯基说，相比于俄罗斯的监狱，奥斯维辛只是小儿科。 Untill 1963 in Poland was just terror. Then from 1963 till 1989 we couldn't grow anyhow, because there were still Russians on our territory. Also we were very poor. I remember when I was very young and my grandmother told me, that during that time in shops there was only vinegar. Then young me get so surprised and asked my grandmother: "grandma, even in Tesco!? (very big shopping center in Poland)". 直到1963年，波兰都还处于恐慌中，从1963年到1989年我们怎么都发展不起来，因为还有俄罗斯人在我们的领土。同时我们还很贫困。我记得我很小的时候，我的祖母告诉我，在那个时期商店里只有卖醋的。年幼的我感到很惊讶并询问祖母：“祖母，包括特易购吗？（波兰很大的购物中心）” People were waiting like 4 hours to get bread (just bread - nothing on it). 人们为了买面包足足排了四个小时的队伍（而且只是面包，没有其他的） So after 1989 we gain independence. We were very poor country with not so educated people, with many bad memories. For example, between 1963 and 1989 there were two kinds of rich people. One were cooperating with government that we hated, the other were just thieves. Many people in Poland still say that rich people are thieves and they still hate government. 所以1989年后我们取得了独立，我们是一个缺乏人才的贫困国家，还充满了许多不堪的回忆。比如，在1963年和1989年间，有两种有钱人，一种是和我们憎恨的政府勾结，另一种靠偷窃致富。许多波兰人都说有钱人是小偷，他们也仍然讨厌政府。 We don't trust other countries. In 1939 UK and France told Hitler, that if he'll attack us, then they'll attack him. Of course they didn't (well, they could end that war in 1939) so we lost our independence for next 50 years. Now we're in NATO, but more than 80% people don't believe, that if anything would happen then NATO would help us. 我们不信任其他国家，在1939年，英国和法国告诉希特勒，如果他攻击我们，那么他们就会攻击他。当然他们并没有那样做（他们本可以结束1939年的战争），所以我们又丢失了50年的独立权。现在我们加入了北约组织，但超过80%的人认为就算波兰发生了什么，北约组织也不会帮助我们。 Back to topic, it's really hard to make a strong and rich country with situation we had in 1989, especially, when west European countries are very rich already. 回到这个话题，像我们在1989年那样的状态下，波兰很难成为一个富强的国家,尤其是已经有很多西方国家变得富有。 Now I feel we're growing, but not very fast. People are changing slowly - young people are very open minded and they have big ambitions. It's becoming better, but it'll take some time till Poland is completely normal country. 现在我觉得我们是在成长，不过比较缓慢。人们在慢慢的改变-年轻人思想开放也有远大志向。一切都在变好，但波兰还需要一些时间恢复成完全正常的国家。 Actually people in Poland are very well educated and they're really brave. People try to make their own businesses and they're friendly. Everything goes in the right direction right now, but it takes some time to lose scars we gain in the past. 实际上，现在波兰人都受到了良好的教育也很勇敢。人们试着做自己的事情也十分友好。现在一切都朝着好的方向发展，但我们仍需要时间忘掉过去的伤痛