There seems to be a recurring trend in history of leaders and rulers not trusting their general staff and attempting to micromanage their armed forces. Hitler, Stalin, Tsar Nick III are the three that spring to mind for me. In doing so they've often implemented awful strategies, sowed discontent amongst their lieutenants, and generally made their army much less effective.
My question is has there ever been a time where a politician or monarch has tried to take direct control, or lay down overly specific orders, and actually made the right call in doing so? I can think of examples of great lords in pre-Modern Europe, but to me that's a different question seeing as the aristocracy was the general staff.
There was an episode in the Federal Period in the United States known as the Whiskey Rebellion. Farmers in Western Pennsylvania and New York went into more-or-less open revolt about what they considered overly high taxes on the grain used to produce whiskey, which was the primary means of taking grain to market before the widespread construction of canals and railroads (a relatively high volume of corn is required to make a barrel of whiskey, and the beverage is relatively stable in storage). It got so bad that George Washington, then sitting as President, rode at the head of a column of 13,000 militiamen in order to quell the rebellion. Resistance melted away before he really arrived, but this is an instance of an American president directly taking control of a military force.
In my opinion, it's good that this is a precedent set by Washington that did not catch on among his successors. That said, I think the very nascent nature of the military and political institutions, combined with the awe with which Washington was held by his contemporaries, make this a relatively unique situation.