Which 1974 novel by Frederick Forsyth features a small group of African and European mercenary soldiers hired by a British industrialist to depose the government of the fictional African country of Zangaro ?
The Dogs of War (novel) The Dogs of War (novel) The Dogs of War (1974) is a war novel by Frederick Forsyth featuring a small group of European mercenary soldiers hired by a British industrialist to depose the government of the fictional African country of Zangaro. An eponymous film was released in 1980, based upon the novel and directed by John Irvin. The movie was filmed on location in Belize. The mercenary protagonists, like the protagonist in the author's earlier novel "The Day of the Jackal" (1971), are professional killers—ruthless, violent men, heroic only in the loosest sense of the word. Thus, they are anti-heroes.
The Dogs of War (novel) prologue shows "Cat" Shannon and his fellow mercenaries leaving a West African war they have lost, saying their goodbyes to the General, who employed them for six months. A few weeks later, a prospector employed by British-based company Manson Consolidated sends mineral samples, acquired from the "Crystal Mountain" in the remote hinterland of the African republic of Zangaro, to headquarters. When they are analysed, ruthless British mining tycoon Sir James Manson realises that there is a huge platinum deposit in Zangaro. The president of Zangaro, Jean Kimba, is Marxist, homicidal, insane, and under Soviet influence, so any public announcement of