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"On the Asia mainland, the guy who controls the food sets the rules."

Not for the guy who doesn't give a damn, it doesn't. The people in North Korea have gone through a couple of starvations while Kim Jong-il has diverted international assistance to the military to keep his troops in decent enough shape to maintain their level of threat. He doesn't care about the people starving, and apparently his people don't care enough about starving to rid themselves of him. The only loyalty that man has comes through fear, uncertainty, and doubt. He runs a paranoid operation mildly reminiscent of Stalin. Perhaps that's why people close to him or high up in power continue defecting to China, and why state officials' visits to foreign nations are very strictly regulated by Kim's inner circle.