Should Canada’s next military leader be a woman? [Video]

The search is on for the next leader of the Canadian Armed Forces — and it’s long past time that a woman became chief of the defence staff, observers say. 

Canada has had 21 full-time defence chiefs since 1964, all of them men. The current top commander, Gen. Wayne Eyre, is due to retire this summer. 

The military has long grappled with what a damning external report by former Supreme Court justice Louise Arbour called a toxic culture of sexual misconduct. 

At the same time, it is dealing with what Defence Minister Bill Blair described this week as a recruitment “death spiral.” 

The forces need “a woman or an openly queer person” as their next leader if real change is going to happen, said veteran Sharp Dopler.

“We’ve been doing this dance with men at the helm for a very long time,” said Dopler. “Look where we are.”

Until 1992, …