The fewer and the proud

Anxious parents, wartime funk, and anti-war counter-recruiters may lower the numbers, but at boot camp the recruits are raring to go to war | John Dawson

PARRIS ISLAND, S.C.–For Andrew Burgess's next feat, he'll roll over a pyramid of logs. It's the morning of March 10, and somehow the 19-year-old feels at home when he's hurdling objects. He's far from home, though, attending boot camp at the Parris Island Marine Corps Recruiting Depot.

The technique for making it over the logs is similar to how Mr. Burgess would have plowed through the line of scrimmage when he was a high-school running back, first in Richland, N.C., and then in Pelion, S.C. Speed is important, but so is balance.

"It's pretty hard, but it's still just training," he says as he takes a breather from the Marine Corps Confidence Course, a series of ropes courses and obstacles that are designed to drag a recruit out of his comfort zone. About 20 yards away, recruits line up to jump off a tower onto a dangling rope. There's a pad below and the recruits are tethered, but still one young man can't seem to make the leap. "Jump onto my rope," one drill instructor tells the hesitant recruit. "Jump," says Mr. Burgess softly so almost no one can hear.