Defection in the Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong "The Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong" is a story of many things when looked at from the right perspective. The validity of the story actually has nothing to do with its main purpose, which is to explain how Vietnam changed the American soldiers who were part of the conflict. O'Brien's purpose is to inform his readers of the effect Vietnam had on American soldiers. Told by Rat Kiley, "The Love of the Song Tra Bong" can be seen as a touching love story; lovers united even during the war. However, the real focus of the story is not love but change and abandonment. Kiley tells the story to illustrate how all the soldiers changed during their experience in Vietnam. The fact that the main character is a woman pushes his point even further. She is the very picture of traditional, wholesome America; the only thing she's missing is an apple pie. Kiley describes her as "This cute blonde - just a little girl, fresh out of high school - shows up with a suitcase and one of those plastic cosmetic bags." (O'Brien 90) This girl is the antithesis of what one would expect to find in Vietnam. She is pure and innocent. During his time in Vietnam he changes from this image to something very different. She spends less time with her boyfriend, Mark Fossie. Mary Anne hangs out with the Green Berets, who are very different from the other soldiers. She eventually becomes one of them, marking a total transformation: "There was no emotion in her gaze, no sense of the person behind it. But the grotesque part, she said, was her jewelry. Around the girl's neck was a necklace of human jewels." Long, narrow tongues, like pieces of blackened leather, were strung along a length of copper wire, one overlapping the other, their tips curling upward as if caught in a final shrill syllable. (O'Brien 110) Vietnam changed Mary Anne; it forced it to become something as foreign to America as the war itself. The "Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong" is also a story of desertion: desertion of people and customs. Mary Anne abandons her boyfriend and her culture. As she becomes more and more involved in Vietnam, she grows distant from her boyfriend, Fossie. One night he disappears and Fossie is shocked: "'He's gone,' said Fossie, 'Rat, listen, he's sleeping with someone.