Until 2007, this was MGM's second highest selling home video title, behind Autant en emporte le vent (1939).
Richard Lynch and his crew blew up a real residential neighborhood during shooting. It was slated for demolition due to expansion of Hartsfield Airport's runway, so the Atlanta Film Commission gave the Cannon Group permission to blow it up. The area is currently the site of the Georgia International Convention Center in College Park, GA.
Cannon completely removed all the story elements and background characters in the editing room, in order to concentrate on Chuck Norris and the action. Editor Daniel Loewenthal has stated that Cannon's cut made the film heavily episodic and pretty much a collection of explosive action scenes.
Chuck Norris performed most of his own stunts, including the scene where he hangs off the side of pick-up while it is driven through shopping center kiosks and windows.
American Warrior II: Le Chasseur (1986) was originally written as a sequel to this film with Chuck Norris returning to the role of Matt Hunter. When he was uninterested, the role was rewritten to be younger and was given to rising Cannon star Michael Dudikoff instead. Despite sharing the same main character name, the finished film was no longer truly a sequel or prequel to the earlier film, but it stood on it's own as a stand-alone movie.