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human
[Marvel] Why did the Soviets turn Bucky into the Winter Soldier?

As opposed to someone who was a Russian and already loyal to their government, and requiring brainwashing to make him from just an experiment in super soldier juice to an actual fighting unit?
gpt
I've just recently read that Bruebaker's run, and essentially it was a combination of circumstance and malice - when Bucky was picked up by Russian submarine, he was essentially braindead or something like that, so when they revived him he was a blank slate, not much brainwashing was required. His muscle memory was intact, so basically a murder machine with amnesia literally fell into their hands.

Secondly, a KGB officer who actually picked him up and spearheaded the Winter Soldier project was personally familiar with Cap and Bucky, and carried a degree of spite towards him, after Cap berated him for shooting wounded nazis in the head after the combat engagement. So personally for him it was very satisfying to take one of (literal) american poster boys and turn him into loyal Russian agent.

Brainwashing was added later down the line, when the project was already well under way, after it became apparent that Bucky starts recovering his memories while on the missions. THEN they've started shocking him in the brain.