Creating RTSUnits in C

I'm having some trouble creating RTSUnits in C++. I've been tinkering with translating the following script code into C++, but haven't been successful. Any help would be much appreciated.

From gameConnection.cs:

%player = new RTSUnit() 
   {
      scale = "1 1 1";
      dataBlock = %data;
      shapeFile = "~/data/shapes/player/player.dts";
      path = "";
   };

   MissionCleanup.add(%player);
   
   %player.setControllingConnection(%this);
   %player.setSkinName( getWord($Pref::Server::TeamInfo[%this.getTeam()], 3) );
   %player.setTeam(%this.getTeam());
   %player.setTransform(%spawnPoint);
   %player.client = %this;
                    
   %player.stats["Kills"] = (getRandom() * 5) % 5;
   %player.stats["Damage Delt"] = (getRandom() * 1000) % 1000;
   
   // Add the unit to the group of units
   %this.units.add(%player);

I haven't reproduced all the statements, mostly because I haven't figured out how yet, but here is a version of what I've got so far:

RTSUnit *unit = new RTSUnit();
unit->registerObject();
unit->setField("scale", "1, 1, 1");
unit->setField("dataBlock", "botBlock");
unit->setField("shapeFile", "~/data/shapes/player/player.dts");
unit->setField("path", "");

RTSConnection *connection = GameConnection::getLocalClientConnection();
unit->setControllingConnection(connection);
unit->setTeam(connection->getTeam());

It runs, but it doesn't produce a unit in the scene. Am I close? What am I missing/doing wrong?

Thanks,
Will