Winter Solider - origin of the name?

[schmevil]

Has Ed Brubaker said what the inspiration was for Bucky's renaming as the Winter Soldier? There are two possibilities that I see:

THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.

Thomas Paine, Crisis 1.

Or the Winter Soldier Investigation into American war crimes in Vietnam, which got its name from a paraphrase of Paine. Btw, the documentary of the investigation is available here.

Has Bru talked about this? Is it explained in the books (which I haven't read straight through)?

Comments

[elspethdixon.livejournal.com]

There's a point during a WWII flashback wherein Lukin's predecessor (I can't remember his name, so let's call him Evil Soviet Guy) tells Steve something like "We don't have all-powerful superheroes like you Americans. All we Russians have is our winter."

And since Evil Soviet Guy is the one who found Bucky in the ice and started the Winter Soldier program, I suspect that's where he got the name -- Russia's super-soldier/assassin named after Russia's other weapon of last resort.