Editing Sun Yat-sen (section)

== Republic of China with multiple governments ==
=== Provisional government ===
{{Main|Provisional Government of the Republic of China (1912)}}
[[File:李鐵夫孫中山12345.jpg|thumb|''Portrait of Sun Yat-sen'' (1921) by [[Li Tiefu]]]]
On 29 December 1911, a meeting of representatives from provinces in Nanjing elected Sun as the [[list of leaders of the Republic of China|provisional president]].<ref>Lane, Roger deWardt. (2008). ''Encyclopedia Small Silver Coins''.  {{ISBN|978-0615244792}}.</ref> 1 January 1912 was set as the [[epoch (reference date)|epoch]] of the new [[Minguo calendar|republican calendar]].<ref name="Well">Welland, Sasah Su-ling. (2007). ''A Thousand Miles of Dreams: The Journeys of Two Chinese Sisters''. Rowman Littlefield Publishing. {{ISBN|978-0742553149}}. p. 87.</ref> [[Li Yuanhong]] was made provisional vice-president, and Huang Xing became the minister of the army. It was argued Sun was a 'compromise candidate' to end an impasse and power struggle between Li Yuanhong and Huang Xing over the role of the Generalissimo.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Esherick |first=Joseph |title=China in Revolution |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield |year=2022 |isbn=9781538162774 |pages=160 |language=English}}</ref> A new [[Provisional Government of the Republic of China (1912)|provisional government]] for the Republic of China was created, along with a [[Provisional Constitution of the Republic of China|provisional constitution]]. Sun is credited for funding the revolutions and for keeping revolutionary spirit alive, even after a series of false starts. His successful merger of smaller revolutionary groups into a single coherent party provided a better base for those who shared revolutionary ideals. Under Sun's provisional government, several innovations were introduced, such as the aforementioned calendar system, and fashionable [[Mao suit|Zhongshan suits]].

=== Beiyang government ===
{{Main|Beiyang government}}
[[Yuan Shikai]], who was in control of the [[Beiyang Army]], had been promised the position of president of the Republic of China if he could get the Qing court to abdicate.<ref name="Fu" /> On 12 February 1912, the Emperor did abdicate the throne.<ref name="Well" /> Sun stepped down as president, and Yuan became the new provisional president in Beijing on 10 March 1912.<ref name="Fu" /> The provisional government did not have any military forces of its own. Its control over elements of the new army that had mutinied was limited, and significant forces still had not declared against the Qing.

Sun Yat-sen sent telegrams to the leaders of all provinces to request them to elect and to establish the [[Provisional Government of the Republic of China (1912)| National Assembly]] in 1912.<ref>[[#Bergère|Bergère]]: 226</ref> In May 1912, the legislative assembly moved from Nanjing to Beijing, with its 120 members divided between members of the Tongmenghui and a republican party that supported Yuan Shikai.<ref name="chien">Ch'ien Tuan-sheng. ''The Government and Politics of China 1912–1949''. Harvard University Press, 1950; rpr. Stanford University Press.  {{ISBN|978-0804705516}}. pp. 83–91.</ref> Many revolutionary members were already alarmed by Yuan's ambitions and the northern-based [[Beiyang government]].

=== New Nationalist party in 1912, failed Second Revolution and new exile ===
The Tongmenghui member [[Song Jiaoren]] quickly tried to control the assembly. He mobilized the old Tongmenghui at the core with the mergers of a number of new small parties to form a new political party, the [[Kuomintang]] (Chinese Nationalist Party, commonly abbreviated as "KMT") on 25 August 1912 at [[Huguang Guild Hall]], Beijing.<ref name="chien" /> The [[1912 Republic of China National Assembly elections|1912–1913 National assembly election]] was considered a huge success for the KMT, which won 269 of the 596 seats in the lower house and 123 of the 274 seats in the upper house.<ref name="Fu">Fu, Zhengyuan. (1993). ''Autocratic tradition and Chinese politics''(Cambridge University Press. {{ISBN|978-0521442282}}). pp. 153–154.</ref><ref name="chien" /> In retaliation, the KMT leader [[Song Jiaoren]] was assassinated, almost certainly by a secret order of Yuan, on 20 March 1913.<ref name="Fu" /> The [[Second Revolution (China)|Second Revolution]] took place by Sun and KMT military forces trying to overthrow Yuan's forces of about 80,000 men in an armed conflict in July 1913.<ref>Ernest Young, "Politics in the Aftermath of Revolution", in John King Fairbank, ed., ''The Cambridge History of China: Republican China 1912–1949'', Part 1 (Cambridge University Press, 1983; {{ISBN|978-0521235419}}), p. 228.</ref> The revolt against Yuan was unsuccessful. In August 1913, Sun fled to Japan, where he later enlisted financial aid by the politician and industrialist [[Fusanosuke Kuhara]].<ref>Altman, Albert A., and Harold Z. Schiffrin. "Sun Yat-Sen and the Japanese: 1914–16." Modern Asian Studies, vol. 6, no. 4, 1972, pp. 385–400. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/311539</ref>

=== Warlords chaos ===
In 1915, Yuan proclaimed the [[Empire of China (1915–1916)|Empire of China]] with himself as [[Emperor of China]]. Sun took part in the [[National Protection War]] of the [[Constitutional Protection Movement]] and also supported bandit leaders like [[Bai Lang Rebellion|Bai Lang]] during the [[Bai Lang Rebellion]], which marked the beginning of the [[Warlord Era]]. In 1915, Sun wrote to the [[Second International]], a [[socialist]]-based organization in [[Paris]], and asked it to send a team of specialists to help China set up the world's first socialist republic.<ref>''South China Morning post''. Sun Yat-sen's durable and malleable legacy. 26 April 2011.</ref> The same year, Sun received the [[India]]n communist [[M.N. Roy]] as a guest.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Thampi |first1=Madhavi |title=India and China in the Colonial World |publisher=Taylor & Francis |page=229}}</ref> There were then [[federalism in China|many theories and proposals]] of what China could be. In the political mess, both Sun Yat-sen and [[Xu Shichang]] were announced as president of the Republic of China.<ref>South China morning post. 1913–1922. 9 November 2003.</ref>