No it wasn't. Point to anything in the source material that suggests they were looking to create an army of super soldiers the size of the regular army.
It couldn't be. Wouldn't be possible. It was already expensive and challenging enough regulating the regular army. Many soldiers turned out to be unfit, defied orders were drunks, dopers or were plain old jerks.
They could only use the cream of the crop in terms of mental and psychological fitness for the super soldier program. And finding them would be very, very difficult. They'd have to be sure that they could handle suddenly being endowed with such power. That they could be trusted and not sell out the secrets for a quick profit.
And again- the expense. They'd have to be kept in optimimum living conditions. Be fed the best food etc. Cap's much debated suit would cost ALOT of money. And it's doubtful they'd have many vibranium-adamantium shields to go around.
Super soldiers would have to give up having a regular life. Like I said, they weren't going to be letting these guys settle anywhere with anyone. The women they'd connect with would have to be investigated. They'd have to study what might happen if these guys had children.
And I never said anything about taking a hardline about sticking to canon. I'm saying use what works best, and for the most part, canon does. That's why Cap has lasted as long as he has.
As far as over-thinking, the weakness of many of these movies is that they're under-thinking when making them. In telling any story the creative folks should consider all aspects of the story, even if it won't actually reach the screen. When creating a character for example, screenwriters are taught to write biographies of not only the character, but his/her parents and even grandparents. All of this to have a thorough understandng of who the character is, even though the grandparents might never even be mentioned in the context of the story. Like I've said, i had great issues with Iron Man's lack of consideration of points even in a world as fantastic as the Marvel Universe. His chest is blown open but he's never in any real pain. He wouldn't even be able to walk for weeks at least. His armor would cost billions to create, but no one asks where the money went. Etc. Etc.... .
I think it goes without saying that the military wanted to create more than one super solider. They might not have wanted everyone to be super soldier, but they definitely wanted more than one to be a super soldier. If they created more than one nuclear bomb, don't you think they'd create more than one super soldier?
And a whole platoon of super soldiers wouldn't be too expensive for one reason: supply and demand. The more there is, the less valuable it is. So, if there were more super soldiers, then the government wouldn't need to waste as many resources keeping them protected because they could just get a new one straight out of the lab. They be like the regular soldiers, and we all know how the goverment sometimes treats the regular soldiers.
Shields and special costumes wouldn't even factor into the cost because there would be no reason for them. Remember, Steve Rogers was reinvented as a superhero with a costume and fancy shield ONLY because he was one of a kind. If he weren't one of a kind, he probably never would have gotten either.
They wouldn't get the best food or shelter, they'd get what everyone else got. I think only officers get special treatment in the military, and even then there are times when they have to eat what the troops eat, and live where the troops live.
And I'm sure the military would only use it's best soldiers for the program; they wouldn't just pick guys at random and hope none of them would abuse the power. You don't see the bad soldiers getting promoted, so what makes you think they'd get a serum to make them super strong and fast? A soldier would have to prove himself before he could become a super soldier, the same way it is with today's special forces. And it's not like you hear about the military only be able to find one or two good candidates for the marines, right?
Super soldiers probably wouldn't be any different than the other people with sensitive knowledge/abilities that the government has handled before. CIA and FBI agents, people who worked on nuclear bombs, high ranking military officers, etc., the government has been taking care of these people for years. And, you know what, I bet all those people live normal lives. It's not like they have to live under constant government supervision, or they get assassinated the day they retire, if they know a government secret. (Okay, suddenly I'm seeing a superhero witness protection program, like in The Incredibles, for former super soliders. Is that weird?)
Finally, I find it hard to take your rant about "under-thinking" in comic book movies seriously when you've taken up half this thread SUPPORTING under-thinking in comic book movies. I mean, how is throwing Captain America into a costume for the simple reason of boosting troop morale, and trashing the USO idea for trying to explain something that SHOULDN'T be explained, NOT an example of under-thinking?
I suggest you re-watch the scene in the hangar between Ross and Blonsky. Because Ross explains that that's exactly what it is.
Again, stupid idea. Hulk = Gamma bomb, not super soldier. His power is too vast and near-godlike to come from the super soldier experiemnt. Again, under-thinking.
I suggest you rewatch the scene again. General Ross tells Blonsky that he dusted off the super soldier program, and had Banner begin work on it under the guise of radition resistance. Blonsky asks Ross if, at the same time, he was "trying other things." Ross admits that he was working on developing the serum for use as a weapon, and that THEY (not Erskine) CREATED (you can't create something that already existed) a very PROMISING (not successful) one.
That says to me that the government wasn't giving Blonsky a dose of the serum they had left over from 1940's, but rather a new one based at least in part off Banner's research.
So, don't go assuming that, just because the words super soldier are mentioned, the same serum is involved. The serum in TIH is clearly different, and that's why Captain America is Captain America, and not the Hulk or Abomination.