Watch Online Free on Watchseries. Thwarted many times in their quest for independence, the Vietnamese independence movement led by Ho Chi Minh finally decisively defeated Vietnam's French colonial overlords at Dien Bien Phu in May of 1954. This documentary uses interviews and newsreel footage to examine the conflict between the French and the Vietnamese. In addition to Vietnam, French Indochina also included Cambodia and Laos. The French-Indochina War lasted from 1946 to 1956, when a Geneva Conference agreement mandated a cease-fire in a temporarily divided Vietnam. It is well to note that it is only after this time that the two Vietnams went to war against each other.