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N. Korean regime has been undergoing significant decay since mid-90's. State control is failing not because of lack of brute force. Corruption is rampant among party officials and military. Security agents are also into it. Lure of money eroded state control to the point that the regime started to fear that the market commands more allegiance form people than the regime itself. Hence, the hasty currency reform, which failed miserably, causing another bout of serious starvation.

On top of it, regular military is in real decay, too. Everybody, civilians or military, has been experiencing acute food shortage, if not outright starvation.

Besides, if you have some seed of internal power struggle inside the regime and immediate neighbors trying hard to interfere and influence the political outcome, things are pretty fluid.

This is not the regime in its youth. It lasted for some 60 years and now badly eroded. Brutal repression has been in effect throughout its entire history. Still now it wears out, and barely standing.

Famine always create serious political complications. There should be enough fanatics who are loyal to the regime in order to ensure regime survival. Such loyalty is now gone.

Tanks worked their magic in N. Korea's past. Before 90's, there were some mass uprisings in provinces which were put down by tanks and troops. They don't have enough fuel for tanks. Most soldiers are malnourished and spend most of their time to find something to eat.