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Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
[Winter Soldier] Questions about Alexander Pierce - SPOILERS

1. Why in the beginning is Pierce so nice to Fury and accept his offer of delaying Project Insight? Also, why would Pierce want Iron Man to be at his kids birthday when once of the targets for insight is iron man himself? Was it all an act?

2. There's the part where the winter soldier is not complying with Hydra and then Pierce slaps him quite hard actually. How can a 75 year old successfully and painfully slap a super soldier?
gpt
1. was some very canny political maneuvering. He made a show of telling the WSC that he was delaying the project because of Fury. Then when Fury was 'killed', the WSC made a redoubled push for Insight that they wouldn't have otherwise made if they weren't fed up with delays. If Cap and Widow hadn't screwed it up for him, Pierce would have come off looking to the rest of the world like the only member of the WSC that *wasn't* gunning for flying murderboats, leaving him in a great position to grab even more political power in the aftermath of Insight's slaughter and inevitable destruction by Thor and Hulk.