Vietnam War. The Vietnam War (Vietnamese: Chiến tranh Việt Nam), also known as the Second Indochina War, and known in Vietnam as Resistance War Against America (Vietnamese: Kháng chiến chống Mỹ) or simply the American War, was a war that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975.