As Wellington Koo, one of the great diplomats of the republican period, emphatically stated, after the Wuchang uprising of 1911 and the revolution that overthrew China’s last dynasty, the sacred source of imperial authority was replaced by the new people of the emerging Chinese nation. Despite a final failed attempt by Yuan Shikai to restore the imperial order in 1916, China was no longer considered by its ruling elite as a central sacral empire with an imperium that expanded potentially universally. It was now one nation among many, whose relations with other countries were no longer articulated through the tribute system or ritual justice but by the rules of international law and a fully fledged Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This period has often been seen as one during which China disintegrated until Mao Zedong’s rule, under which it was reunified.