High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Second French Indochina Campaign, also known as the Japanese coup of March 1945, was a Japanese military operation in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam, then a French colony and known as French Indochina, during the final months of the Second World War. Vietnam was not a real colony at this time. The area known as Cochinchina was a colony proper. However, the regions of Annam and Tonkin were French "protectorates". The campaign resulted in short-lived independence of the Empire of Vietnam, the Kingdom of Laos and the Kingdom of Cambodia, and in the complete disorganization of Indochina's French administration. A small-scale campaign of guerrilla warfare followed, while France prepared to retaliate, but Japan ultimately surrendered before any major military engagements could take place.