If there were any doubts about the type of government Boris Johnson plans to lead, they ended with the ruthless cabinet reshuffle he conducted hours after taking over as British prime minister.
Eleven of Theresa May's 29 cabinet members were sacked, and six others resigned before they were pushed.
Out went the moderate Conservatives and backers of leadership rival Jeremy Hunt, in came right-wing politicians and advisers who played central roles in the 2016 campaign to take Britain out of the European Union.
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It is a team with hard Brexit believers in key roles and disrupters strategically positioned.
Michael Gove, co-head of the Vote Leave campaign, takes up a position as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster – a role that gives him a wide-ranging brief. Gove, a former journalist, has a history of shaking up government departments.
Dominic Cummings, the mastermind behind Vote Leave who was played by Benedict Cumberbatch in a recent Brexit TV drama, is now Johnson's top political adviser. Cummings, a former aide to Gove, is regarded as a brilliant but abrasive strategist who isn't afraid to make enemies in pursuit of pushing through change.
Cummings wrote an open letter eviscerating Theresa May's Brexit strategy in 2018 and arguing that "Brexit cannot be done with the traditional Westminster/Whitehall system."
Michael Gove and Boris Johnson pictured during a "Vote Leave" press conference in the wake of the Brexit referendum, London, June 24, 2016. /VCG Photo
If the appointments of Gove and Cummings indicate a plan to shock the system, the makeup of Johnson's top team suggests a move to the right and an unapologetically hardline approach to Brexit – though several of the old-guard Conservative euroskeptics were frozen out and some backers of the May deal do remain.
Dominic Raab, who has flirted with the idea suspending parliament to push through a no-deal Brexit, replaces Hunt as foreign secretary. Priti Patel, a hardliner sacked by May for unauthorized meetings with Israeli officials, is elevated to home secretary, the British equivalent of interior minister. And Sajid Javid, who campaigned to stay in the EU but has had a conversion since the referendum, takes over at the Treasury.
Javid, a Thatcherite supporter of low taxes and free markets, will be charged with guiding the British economy through Brexit. His immediate priority will be freeing up money to cushion the impact of a no-deal Brexit, as well as funding Johnson's various spending pledges.
The lower rungs of the cabinet are filled with Brexit-backers alongside a sprinkling of converts who backed Johnson during the leadership campaign thrown in, while several staffers from the Vote Leave campaign head into Downing Street as advisers.
New British Prime Minister Boris Johnson speaks to media outside Number 10, Downing Street in London, July 24, 2019. /VCG Photo
The ruthlessness of the reshuffle also poses dangers for Johnson, especially given the government's wafer-thin majority in parliament. While some departing ministers were reluctant to serve under the new prime minister, others may not take their exits well.
Hunt refused a demotion from foreign secretary to defense and leaves the government, joining a number of big names on the backbenches. Almost every minister who supported Hunt in the leadership contest was sacked, including prominent Brexit supporter Penny Mordaunt.
The Conservative Party is already split on Brexit, and the new cabinet is in no way unifying.
Prime ministers are never as powerful as on the day they enter office and Johnson took his moment to install the team he wanted with savage efficiency. But by wielding the axe so broadly, he also risks creating enemies at a time he needs all the support he can get.
The new prime minister has a little over three months to find a Brexit solution and has acted quickly to make wholesale changes in approach and personnel – as well as put back together a winning team that could soon be running an election campaign.