join the Polish army, and not seeing much opportunity to advance in his military career in the now-peaceful Saxony, on 28 June 1792, Dąbrowski joined the Army of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth with a rank of podpułkownik and on 14 July he was promoted to the rank of vice-brigadier. Joining in the final weeks of the Polish–Russian War of 1792, he did not see combat in it. Unfamiliar with the intricacies of Polish politics, like many of Poniatowski's supporters, he joined the Targowica Confederation in late 1792. Dąbrowski was seen as a cavalry expert, and King Stanisław August Poniatowski was personally interested in obtaining Dąbrowski's services. As a cavalryman educated in a Dresden military school under Count Maurice Bellegarde, a reformer of the Saxon army's cavalry, Dąbrowski was asked to help modernize the Polish cavalry, serving in the ranks of the 1st Greater Poland Cavalry Brigade (1 Wielkpolska Brygada Kawalerii Narodowej). In January 1793, stationed around Gniezno with two units of cavalry, about 200 strong, he briefly engaged the Prussian forces entering Poland in the aftermath of the Second Partition of Poland, and afterwards became a known activist, advocating the continuation of military struggle against the occupiers. The Grodno Sejm, held in the fall of 1793, nominated him for a membership in a military commission; this caused him to be viewed with suspicion by the majority of the dissatisfied military, and he was not included in the preparations for the upcoming uprising. Thus he was taken by surprise when the Kościuszko Insurrection erupted, and his own brigade mutinied. He declared his support for the insurgents after the liberation of Warsaw, and from then on took an active part in the uprising, defending Warsaw and leading an army corps in support of an uprising in Greater Poland. His courage was commended by Tadeusz Kościuszko himself, the Supreme Commander of the National Armed Forces, who promoted him to the rank of general. In the Napoleonic service After the failure of the uprising he remained in partitioned Poland for a while, attempting to convince the Prussian authorities that they needed Poland as an ally against Austria and Russia. He was unsuccessful, and with the Third Partition of Poland between Russia, Prussia and Austria, Poland disappeared from the map of Europe. Dąbrowski's next solution was to convince the French Republic that it should support a Polish cause, and create a Polish military formation. This proved