Following the collapse of the Qing dynasty and the 1911 Revolution, Yuan Shikai assumed the presidency of the newly formed Republic of China. Yuan was frustrated in a short-lived attempt to restore monarchy in China, and China fell into power struggle after his death in 1916. The Kuomintang, led by Sun Yat-sen, created a rival government in Guangzhou. After Sun's efforts to obtain aid from Western countries were ignored, he turned to the Soviet Union. In 1923, Sun and Soviet representative Adolph Joffe in Shanghai pledged Soviet assistance to China's unification in the Sun-Joffe Manifesto, a declaration of cooperation among the Comintern, KMT and CCP. Comintern agent Mikhail Borodin arrived in 1923 to aid in the reorganization and consolidation of both the CCP the KMT along the lines of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The CCP and the KMT formed the First United Front.