The most selective U.S. military service is apparently about to get more selective

The Marines are famously picky about who they will accept as recruits. They apparently plan to get even pickier:

As the U.S. Marine Corps pushes to develop a more mature and highly skilled force, top brass may opt to raise the bar to get to boot camp.
Lt. Gen. Robert Walsh, deputy commandant of Marine Corps Combat Development Command, said requiring higher scores on the general technical, or GT, portion of the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery is one option under consideration as leaders work to shape the future force.

I think this is an effort by the Marines to remain the point of the spear -- first deployed, always. It is the historic role of the Marine Corps -- "First to fight," as the song says. I guess we'll see where this goes, It seems to be a nod to the growing role of technology in warfare:

Efforts to develop more sophisticated decision-making and leadership skills at every level in the service are also behind the effort to raise the bar for incoming Marines. The Corps' Expeditionary Force-21 strategy calls for smaller units to operate more independently and in a more disaggregated manner than they have in the past.
"The big challenge is looking to the future and bringing in the right talent. I'll be honest: we're looking very hard at recruiting," Walsh said. "We're very successful in recruiting, but we're looking at raising the bar in our entry-level capabilities on who we bring in, GT scores and what [military occupational specialties] they go to. What we're seeing is, the entire force we want to raise up to a higher level."

I guess we'll see how this turns out.