ABSTRACT
The elections of 1928 revealed that the Pilsudskiists, at least for the time being, were unable to obtain a democratic support strong enough to govern the country in a parliamentary way. Politically, the Pilsudskiists were becoming a loose confederation of competing groups, united mostly by their past and by their common animosity toward the opposition. The interest of the ruling military stratum explains the failure of the post-May regime to formulate and implement progressive policies of economic reforms. The rulers of post-May Poland moved with skill and determination toward both a strengthening of their hold on political power and a stabilization of the political regime. As the Soviet Union had no common frontier with Germany, Poland's hostility excluded it from any direct role in an anti-German coalition, even if such a coalition was to emerge. When the Soviet army entered Poland, on September 17, the military situation, already desperate, became totally untenable.
