The Washington Conference of 1921–1922 which refused equal status to Japan in terms of naval power, and the abrogation of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, which had sustained Japan from 1902, played into the hands of the small, vocal military clique in Japan which held strong anti-western fascist views. The emergence of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics following the Russian Revolution of 1917 frightened many in Japan and weakened the already feeble socialist movement there. On the Chinese mainland, the Japanese military radicals never failed to display aggressiveness, deepening their involvement in the invasion of north-east China. Militarism gained force and the party-led government lost their ground. Of twelve prime ministers between 1920 and 1936, five were targets for assassination and three were murdered. This terrible trend was well illustrated by the two abortive military coups of 15 May 1932 and 26 February 1936 and culminated in the founding of Manchukuo in 1932 and the war against China from 1937. The isolation which the Washington Conference agreements brought about in the aftermath of the abolition of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance had far-reaching repercussions. The political and military crises were certainly exacerbated by the disaster of the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1 September 1923, which did great damage to Japan's economy and indirectly brought about the Japanese banking collapse of 1927 which preceded that on Wall Street of October 1929, which in turn resulted in world-wide recession.