John
Hersey Michaelis (August
20, 1912 – October 31, 1985) was a United States Army four-star
general who served as Commander in Chief, United Nations Command/Commander, United States Forces Korea/Commanding
General, Eighth United States Army from
1969 to 1972. Michaelis was a 1936 graduate of the United States Military
Academy. In World War II, Michaelis was executive officer of
the 502nd Parachute Infantry
Regiment, but took command of the unit after the commanding
officer, George Van Horn Moseley
Jr., broke his leg in the drop into Normandy. Later, Michaelis was
severely wounded in the Netherlands.[3] He served as chief of staff of the 101st Airborne Division during
the Battle of Bastogne and
ended the war as a colonel. He served as aide-de-camp to General of the
Army Dwight Eisenhower from
1947 to 1948. During the Korean War, Michaelis
commanded the 27th
Infantry Regiment (the "Wolfhounds") at the Pusan perimeter, for which
he received a Distinguished
Service Cross.[5] Early in the war, most American units were
prone to breaking down and retreating. However his unit fared much better,
General Matthew Ridgway believed,
because Colonel Michaelis had been an airborne commander and therefore did not
panic whenever his unit was in danger of being surrounded.[ For
as long as his unit preserved unit integrity with interlocking fields of fire,
then it could handle being surrounded and cut off as they could be resupplied
from the air. It was to become an important template used by Ridgway in his
conduct of the Korean War once he assumed command from General of the
Army Douglas MacArthur.[
Ridgeway's policy was to become one of "No more retreat" and he
sought to acquire many more commanders like Michaelis as the war continued.[
In fact, shortly after Ridgeway took command, he began to improve the Army's
morale by sending the units north, starting with Michaelis's unit, under an
offensive named Operation Wolfhound in their honor. Michaelis's unit began a
new phase of the war that started a complete turnaround for U.N. troops. He was
promoted to brigadier general in 1951. Michaelis described the Turkish Brigade's combat readiness in unflattering terms,
according to American historian Clay Blair. Blair wrote that war correspondents were misled into thinking that the
Turks were "tough" fighters by their "flowing mustaches, swarthy
complexions, and fierce demeanors", while in fact Blair declared them
"ill trained, ill led, and green to combat." Blair quoted Michaelis
as stating: The Turks were commanded by an aged brigadier who
had been a division commander at Gallipoli in 1916 fighting the British! He was
highly respected, high up in the Turkish military establishment, and took a
bust to brigadier to command the brigade. The average Turk soldier in the
brigade came from the steppe country of Turkey, near Russia, had probably had
only three or four years of school, was uprooted, moved to western Turkey,
given a uniform, [a] rifle, and a little smattering of training, stuck on a
ship, sailed ten thousand miles, then dumped off on a peninsula – 'Korea,
where's that?' – and told the enemy was up there someplace, go get him! The
Turk soldier scratches his head and says, 'What's he done to me?' In 1952,
Michaelis returned to the United States and became commandant of cadets at
the United States Military
Academy.[4] Later he commanded the Fifth Army.[4] He was promoted to full general upon his
retirement in 1972.