Cochin China

Cochin China, former French colony in Southeast Asia, comprising the Mekong River Delta area of southern Vietnam. France became influential in the area in the late 1700s and within a century had formally annexed the delta region as a colony. In the 1880s France created the Indochinese Union, popularly called French Indochina, which included Cochin China, Annam in central Vietnam, Tonkin in northern Vietnam, and Laos and Cambodia to the west. The Union broke apart after World War II (1939-1945), eventually becoming the independent countries of Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam.