In signing of the Entente Cordiale both powers reduced the virtual isolation into which they had withdrawn—France involuntarily, Britain complacently—while they had eyed each other over African affairs. Britain had no major-power ally apart from Japan (1902), which held little in European waters; France had none but the Russian Empire, soon to become militarily discredited in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05. The agreement upset the diplomacy of Germany, whose policy had long relied on Franco-British antagonism. A German attempt to check the French in Morocco in 1905 (the Tangier Incident, or First Moroccan Crisis), and thus to upset the Entente, served only to strengthen it. Military discussions between the French and the British general staffs were soon initiated. Franco-British solidarity was confirmed at the Algeciras Conference (1906) and reconfirmed in the Second Moroccan Crisis (1911).