The 1793 Second Partition of Poland was the second of three partitions (or partial annexations) that ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth by 1795. The second partition occurred in the aftermath of the Polish–Russian War of 1792 and the Targowica Confederation of 1792, and was approved by its territorial beneficiaries, the Russian Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia. The division was ratified by the coerced Polish parliament (Sejm) in 1793 (see the Grodno Sejm) in a short-lived attempt to prevent the inevitable complete annexation of Poland, the Third Partition. Background By 1790, on the political front, the Commonwealth had deteriorated into such a helpless condition that it was forced into an alliance with its enemy, Prussia. The Polish-Prussian Pact of 1790 was signed, giving false hope that the Commonwealth might have at last found an ally that would shield it while it reformed itself. The May Constitution of 1791 enfranchised the bourgeoisie, established the separation of the three branches of government, and eliminated the abuses of the Repnin Sejm. Those reforms prompted aggressive actions on the part of its neighbours, wary of the potential renaissance of the Commonwealth. The Empress Catherine II was angered; arguing that Poland had fallen prey to the radical Jacobinism then at high tide in France, Russian forces invaded the Commonwealth in 1792. During the Polish–Russian War of 1792 in Defense of the Constitution, the Polish forces supporting the Constitution fought against the army of the Russian Empire, invited by the pro-Russian alliance of Polish magnates, known as the Targowica Confederation. The conservative nobility (see also, szlachta) believed that the Russians would help them restore their Golden Liberty. Abandoned by their Prussian allies, the badly outnumbered Polish pro-Constitution forces fought under Prince Józef Poniatowski a defensive war with some measure of success, but were ordered to abandon their efforts by their supreme commander, King Stanisław August Poniatowski. The King decided to join the Targowica Confederation, as demanded by the Russians. Russia invaded Poland to ensure the defeat of the Polish reforms, with no overt goal of another partition (it viewed Poland as its protectorate, and saw little need to give up chunks of Poland to other countries). Frederick William II of Prussia, however, saw those events as an opportunity to strengthen his country. Frederick demanded from Catherine that for his country's abandoning Poland as a close ally, for Prussian participation in the War of the