Donald Trump laid out an "America first" policy of national self-interest and of non-intervention... by threatening war and the total annihilation of North Korea, as well as the futures of at least two other countries.
In a tightly scripted address to the United Nations General Assembly, the populist President used a technique that carried him to the White House to try to reach around the rulers in attendance to those whom they rule.
But it was his direct threat to North Korea that will have got the world leaders gathered in New York to sit up and listen.
"If America is forced to defend itself and its allies," he said, "we will have no choice but to destroy North Korea."
This was a direct threat of a pre-emptive nuclear strike on the north of the Korean peninsula. There is no other way to "destroy North Korea" or destroy any country.
He's used similar language - "fire and fury" - in the past, but that was off the cuff.This was a carefully considered, direct threat that needs to be taken at face value - no matter how unpredictable, vain or downright silly Mr Trump's enemies may like to see him as.
This was a threat made in the temple of international diplomacy - not in a moment of frustration or an ill-considered early morning session on Twitter.
A regime he described as "wicked" was being supported, he said, by others (he did not name China nor Russia but thanked them for backing the last set of UN Security Council sanctions).
But these two global powers will take him as seriously as he intends them to.
Iran, meanwhile, was singled out. Not for destruction, but the deal done to suspend its development of a nuclear weapon in return for the lifting of sanctions.
He warned that Iran could not continue to sponsor terrorist groups in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the Assad regime in Syria. Yet Mr Trump stopped short of saying that he would abandon the Iran agreement.
Venezuela's "socialist dictator" Nicolas Maduro was singled out for a cuffing too. This government, he said, should come under greater pressure from its neighbours and others in the region to bring about the restoration of democracy.
In the case of both Iran and Venezuela, he went to some lengths to point out that the oil rich nations had impoverished their own people and appealed to those same people to choose between continued oppression and freedom.
This may be a weakness. If the US calls on the "oppressed" to rise up, just as America freed itself of British rule, those who rise might expect help from the nation that said it would back them.
It's not clear that Mr Trump understood that.