By Howard Schneider
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, October 9 1996; Page A34

Canada's chief of the defense staff, Gen. Jean Boyle, resigned following weeks of criticism over his command of the country's armed forces.

Boyle is the second top member of the Canadian defense establishment to quit in the past week; Defense Minister David Collenette resigned on Friday. Although Collenette said he was quitting for reasons unrelated to the armed forces, the two resignations could ease what had become a distracting controversy over the leadership of Canada's 80,000 defense personnel.

Boyle's command of that force has been under scrutiny for much of the year, and intensely so since August, when he testified for more than a week during an inquiry into the 1993 beating death of a teenager by Canadian peacekeeping troops in Somalia. Boyle was not involved in the incident itself, but he was in charge of defense information when documents related to the killing were altered before being released to a reporter.

At the inquiry, Boyle was critical of his subordinates but rejected demands that he accept responsibility himself. That position opened him to repeated criticism from retired generals and defense analysts and, according to polls, a loss of public support as well.

In his resignation letter, Boyle said he felt that for him to remain in his job after Collenette resigned "would increasingly become the focus of attention and would jeopardize both the [new] minister's ability to carry out his duties . . . and my ability to focus on the important issues facing the Canadian Forces."