This changed in 1979, when a group of commando units was formed within the UDA under the name Ulster Defence Force (UDF), in order to take advantage of British Intelligence Corps documents that the UDA had obtained detailing the whereabouts of several republican leaders.
John McMichael was killed by a bomb attached to his car outside his Hilden Court home, in Lisburn's loyalist Hilden estate, on 22 December 1987, shortly before his fortieth birthday.