The Dogs of War is a 1980 American war film based upon the 1974 novel of the same name by Frederick Forsyth. Largely filmed in Belize, it was directed by John Irvin and starred Christopher Walken and Tom Berenger. In it a small mercenary unit of soldiers is privately hired to depose the president of a fictional African country modeled after Guinea-Bissau, Guinea-Conakry, Equatorial Guinea and Angola (as they were in the late 1970s), so that a British tycoon can gain access to a platinum deposit.The title is based on a phrase from William Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar: "Cry, 'Havoc!', and let slip the dogs of war."