After King of the Ring, Austin was left without a feud as Benoit was lost for the next year after neck surgery and Jericho moved on to other things. He began a small spat with Angle over who was McMahon's biggest supporter. Meanwhile, the purchase of World Championship Wrestling (WCW) by McMahon began to bear fruit as The Invasion began. McMahon was not able to fight off the invading WCW wrestlers, and when they formed an alliance with a group of Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) alumni that were signed to the WWF and both Shane and Stephanie McMahon were now aligned against their father, McMahon's empire began to crumble and he had zero help from his two biggest stars at the time. Austin made it known that he was against teaming with Angle, whom Austin saw as both a threat to his WWF Championship, as well as an annoying tag-along. Finally, a frustrated McMahon called Austin out and demanded that he bring "the old Stone Cold" back, even going as far as asking Austin to give him a Stone Cold Stunner, so he could effectively captain a team of WWF wrestlers in a ten-man tag team match at the upcoming InVasion pay-per-view in July. A dejected Austin initially refused, but on the following episode of "Raw Is War" he returned to his old ways and hit Stunners on every member of the Alliance, turning face again. At InVasion, Austin captained the WWF team consisting of himself, Angle, Jericho, and The Undertaker and Kane against the team of WCW's Booker T and Diamond Dallas Page and ECW's Rhyno and The Dudley Boyz. Late in the match, however, as Angle had Booker in the ankle lock, Austin turned on Angle by Stunning him and joined the Alliance, turning Austin heel once again. The reason why Austin did this was that he felt McMahon was grooming Angle to take over his spot, that he was trying to get in touch with The Rock to return, and that he was "unappreciated" when McMahon insisted that he return to the old Austin. Austin was immediately made the Alliance's new leader and began to feud with Angle over his WWF Championship.