South Koreans do not identify enough with their "unloved republic" to feel anger when the North humiliates it, and they are reassured enough by the m… - Brian Reynolds Myers

Western observers focus more on the regime's economic failures than the North Koreans themselves do. Remember that it was only in recent modern times that Western societies began expecting the state to secure constant economic growth and rising prosperity. Well into the 20th century people expected little more from the state than that it protect them from foreign powers, and expand the influence or territory of the nation. Prussia was remarkably like North Korea in many ways, yet we remember it as a very successful state. If we judge North Korea by its own standards — instead of by the communist standards we hope its people judge it by — we must admit it has performed very well.

Korean nationalism is its emphasis on the vulnerability of the race.

North Korea is looking more and more like a poor man's version of South Korea.