Shantung brings us to what Japan did in the Great War. In 1914, China could easily have been induced to join the Allies and to set to work to turn the Germans out of Kiao-Chow, but this did not suit the Japanese, who undertook the work themselves and insisted upon the Chinese remaining neutral (until 1917). Having captured Tsing-tau, they presented to the Chinese the famous Twenty-One Demands, which gave the Chinese Question its modern form. These demands, as originally presented in January 1915, consisted of five groups. The first dealt with Shantung, demanding that China should agree in advance to whatever terms Japan might ultimately make with Germany as regarded this Chinese province, that the Japanese should have the right to construct certain specified railways, and that certain ports (unspecified) should be opened to trade; also that no privileges in Shantung should be granted to any Power other than Japan. The second group concerns South Manchuria and Eastern Inner Mongolia, and demands what is in effect a protectorate, with control of railways, complete economic freedom for Japanese enterprise, and exclusion of all other foreign industrial enterprise. The third group gives Japan a monopoly of the mines and iron and steel works in a certain region of the Yangtze,[63] where we claim a sphere of influence. The fourth group consists of a single demand, that China shall not cede any harbour, bay or island to any Power except Japan. The fifth group, which was the most serious, demanded that Japanese political, financial, and military advisers should be employed by the Chinese Government; that the police in important places should be administered by Chinese and Japanese jointly, and should be largely Japanese in _personnel_; that China should purchase from Japan at least 50 per cent. of her munitions, or obtain them from a Sino-Japanese arsenal to be established in China, controlled by Japanese experts and employing Japanese material; that Japan should have the right to construct certain railways in and near the Yangtze valley; that Japan should have industrial priority in Fukien (opposite Formosa); and finally that the Japanese should have the right of missionary propaganda in China, to spread the knowledge of their admirable ethics.