In The Sympathizer, the Captain frames Major Oanh, played by Phanxinê, to cover up his own spying activities.
Like the Captain, Major Oanh is an officer in the Secret Police in South Vietnam and one of the General’s men.
Toward the end of the war, the General asks the Captain to choose the officers who will accompany him to the US.
The Captain selects officers who appear capable but are actually incompetent, and Major Oanh is among them.
Major Oanh is permitted to bring only two other people with him—his wife and daughter—which means he will have to leave his elderly mother behind.
However, due to his strong attachment to his mother, he decides to take her to the US instead of his daughter.
Framing Major Oanh
In the US, the General loses the respect and privileges he enjoyed back home. Disillusioned, his own people turn against him.
Due to that, the General becomes convinced that there is a spy among them. The Captain, who is the real spy, is tasked with rooting out the spy.
To identify the spy, the General and Claude interrogate all of the General’s men. To save himself, the Captain shifts the blame onto Major Oanh.
The Captain claims that Major Oanh is the spy because he still maintains contacts in Saigon and smuggles candy from Vietnam.
Given that Major Oanh’s father is from China, it becomes easy for the General to believe that he is a spy.
The General’s belief in Major Oanh’s guilt deepens further upon learning that Major Oanh’s family is thriving in Vietnam, while other officers’ families have been sent to reeducation camps.
The Captain is then asked to eliminate Major Oanh. He tails him with Bon and finds out that Major Oanh is a father to a pair of newborn twins.
The fact that he has just had children makes it harder for the Captain to kill him for a crime he did not commit. The Captain employs Bon’s help to kill Major Oanh.
Bon has not been himself since he lost his family, but the assassination gives Bon a new purpose in life, which leads to the Captain dismissing any second thoughts about it.
Becoming American
Major Oanh is a character who has embraced what it means to be an American. He believes that he can be anyone in this country.
He also believes that he must be rich to become fully American. The other option is to keep wandering between two worlds forever.
Major Oanh has started a candy business to make money. He buys expired American candy at a discounted price and exports it to Vietnam. The Captain finds out about his business.
The Captain promises to keep his business a secret from the General. In exchange, Major Oanh agrees to make the Captain his business partner.
What Major Oanh does not know is that the Captain has only become his business partner to frame him.
The Captain hides a letter with a coded message, which is very easy to decipher, inside one of Major Oanh’s candy boxes.
The Captain leaves Major Oanh’s “America, Love it or Leave it” sticker to make his death seem like a racial crime.
After his death, Claude finds the letter that the Captain planted and becomes convinced that Major Oanh was a spy.
He also tells the Captain that Major Oanh suspected the Captain of being a spy. Major Oanh’s suspicions were right, but no one would know.
Now that the General believes that the spy has been caught and killed, the Captain is safe, the guilt of killing Major Oanh haunts the Captain, causing him to imagine seeing Major Oanh’s ghost everywhere.