Mike: "When no one knows, they're safe, because enemies and people who'd....who'd take advantage of them or use them or send them to fight their wars can't identify them." Mike knew this. After Erksine's death, his dad had gotten caught up by the show people and Mike had gone straight to the front lines, in his grandfather's and Bucky's regiment. He'd been captured with half of the regiment and had been jailed with the members that would soon be the Howling Commandos, only first speaking to Bucky face to face when he, Bucky and a few others had been taken away by Hydra. Bucky was experimented on but Mick was used solely for torture. They saw his youth and thought him easy to break, but Mike had never broken. And they had never figured out he was a supersoldier, so the anonymity had protected him. He knew if they had known what he was it would have been infinitely worse.