The
Sino-French War (, , ), also known as the
Tonkin War and
Tonquin War, was a limited conflict fought from August 1884 through April 1885, to decide whether France would supplant China's control of
Tonkin (northern
Vietnam). Although the Chinese armies performed better than in other nineteenth-century foreign wars and the war ended with French defeat on land, the French gained most of the aims they wanted in the Treaty of Tientsin.