 The country was also struggling financially, with inflation as a result of these internal factors.Subsequently, the Meiji government adopted a passive policy, encouraging the Korean court to follow the Japanese model but offering little concrete assistance except for the dispatch of the small military mission headed by Lieutenant Horimoto Reizo to train the "Pyŏlgigun".What worried the Japanese was the Chinese, who had loosened their hold over Korea in 1876 when the Japanese succeeded in establishing a legal basis for Korean independence by ending its tributary status.