  We investigate the influence of the external tidal field of a dark matter
halo on the dynamical evolution of star clusters using direct N-body
simulations, where we assume that the halo is described by a Navarro, Frenk &
White mass profile which has an inner density cusp. We assess how varying the
mass and concentration of the halo affects the rate at which the star cluster
loses mass and we find that increasing halo mass and concentration drives
enhanced mass loss rates and in principle shorter cluster disruption
timescales. In addition, we examine disruption timescales in a three-component
model of a galaxy (bulge, disk and dark matter halo) and find good agreement
with results based on an empirical model of the Galactic potential if we assume
a halo mass of ~1e12 solar masses. In general, dark matter halos are expected
to contribute significantly to the masses of galaxies and should not be ignored
when modelling the evolution of star clusters. We extend our results to discuss
how this can have a potentially profound effect on the disruption timescales of
globular clusters, suggesting that we may underestimate the rate at which
primordial globular clusters are disrupted.
