All small countries are pushed around and exploited by bigger ones, in one way or another; some more than others. It's the way of the world.

But your analysis won't wash. NK is an outlaw state, run by a military ruling class that has run the place into the ground for so long it can't back out now; they fear the fire next time when they lose their grip. No place else is anywhere near this screwed up, not modern Iran or Saddam's Iraq or Khadaffi's Libya; not even Zimbabwe, or Pol Pot's Cambodia. They may have brutalized their own people, but they didn't threaten to attack the world.

And the Koreans know what happens to governments like theirs--sooner or later. Some kinds of evil cannot be blamed on economics or religion or ideology or the reaction to them. Some people are just no damn good.

The big difference is NK actually does have WMDs.