Chapters 4–6 Summary and Analysis
Chapter 4
The plane lands in Guam, and the narrator, Bon, the General, and a number of their compatriots find themselves refugees on American soil. After they're moved to Camp Pendleton, near San Diego, the narrator writes his first letter to Man—by way of his aunt—to reestablish contact. To avoid suspicion, the narrator addresses the aunt as though she were his own and uses coded phrases to indicate whether or not he's written a secondary message in invisible ink.
Shortly after their arrival, the General pulls the narrator aside and confides a suspicion: he thinks they have a spy among them. Anxious that he may have been discovered, the narrator cautiously inquires whether the General suspects anyone in particular, quickly realizing that the General is asking him the same question. Feeling pressed to choose a name or find himself under suspicion, the narrator offers a guess he hopes will distract the General: a major whom neither of them especially respects.
Soon, they find themselves settling in Los Angeles. Over the course of the first year, they achieve some normalcy—Bon and the narrator share an apartment, and the General and his formidable wife, Madame, rent a bungalow near Hollywood. The narrator, having spent his college years in the United States for the covert purpose of better understanding the enemy, obtains a stultifying administrative job in the "Oriental Studies" department at his alma mater.
Chapter 5
The General prepares to open a new liquor store, hiring Bon as a clerk, and soon he summons the narrator to meet him. To his dismay, his superior gives him a very upsetting mission: since the major is a spy—an allegation for which they have no actual evidence—he expects the narrator to kill him.
When he returns home and tells Bon, his grieving friend insists on doing the "dirty stuff" himself—if the narrator plans the execution, Bon will pull the trigger. It's the first time, the narrator realizes, that Bon has seemed happy all year.
Around this time, the narrator and Ms. Sofia Mori, the secretary of the Oriental Studies department, begin an affair.
Chapter 6
At the liquor store's grand opening, the Narrator tries to encourage the major to move away. When he fails, he guiltily wanders through the crowd and is surprised to see a familiar face: Sonny, a fellow exchange student from his college years. Their relationship, the narrator recalls, was a complex one: though they're both communists at heart, they only know each other in the context of the narrator's public facade as a capitalist. He's surprised, then, when Sonny—now a journalist, covering the opening for a new Vietnamese-language newspaper—seems genuinely glad to see him and suggests they meet sometime for coffee.
A week later, the narrator and the major go out for breakfast. The narrator starts making his plans for the execution and feels guiltier and guiltier the more he learns about the man. Later, at home, he watches Bon eagerly clean the gun. It's good to have a purpose again, Bon tells him.
Still conflicted about the major's innocence at a dinner the following week, Claude reassures the narrator that his guilt or innocence doesn't really matter in the end—no man in their business is innocent. That Fourth of July, camouflaged by the constant sounds of fireworks, the Narrator and Bon shoot the major in the forehead.
Analysis
These chapters represent the beginning of a difficult transition for the narrator. As a high-ranking military officer, he's passively participated in the violence of others in the past. This, though, is new—no longer separated from the consequences of his actions by a...
(This entire section contains 776 words.)
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level of bureaucracy, he's now tasked with carrying out a violent act himself. Bon, by contrast, seems invigorated by the violence. For the first time since Linh and Duc were killed, the narrator notices that his friend seems energetic and engaged.
An interesting narrative choice is highlighted as the talk of the major becomes more prevalent in these chapters—the narrator nearly always refers to him as the "crapulent major." This is an example of a pattern—with the exception of Bon and Man, for whom the narrator cares deeply, the military personnel in this story are rarely given names. This has the effect of diminishing their humanity and instead casting them as expendable.
In the major's case, the constant addition of "crapulent" as an epithet might be interpreted as the narrator's attempt to dehumanize the man even further—if the narrator can distance himself from the major's humanity and reduce him to a drunken, expendable military pawn, maybe he'll feel less guilty about his participation in the murder.
