 The delineating line between Russian (north) and Japanese (south) spheres of influences in China was the Chinese Eastern Railway.On 18 December 1916 the British Admiralty again requested naval assistance from Japan.The new Japanese cabinet under Prime Minister Terauchi Masatake was more favorably inclined to provide military assistance, provided that the British government back Japan's territorial claims to the newly acquired German possessions in the South Pacific and Shandong.