1996–1999 — The Arduous March Famine & the Chongjin Vessel
Baptist Press, January 22, 1999 names Amigos Internacionales by name as the coordinator of a 6,000-metric-ton vessel to Chongjin, North Korea — in consortium with World Vision, Mercy Corps, CARE, and Catholic Relief Services. Baptist Standard 2024 separately confirms Dr. John spent three months in North Korea in 1997 as an Amigos representative.
Between 1994 and 1999, North Korea experienced the Arduous March — a four-to-five-year famine that killed an estimated 600,000 to 1 million people, 3 to 5 percent of the pre-crisis population. Amigos Internacionales, then headquartered in Waco, Texas with operations managed from Longview, Texas, coordinated the American Baptist response: a soil-testing deployment, a 3-month monitoring presence inside North Korea, monthly Breedlove Dehydrator containers at 3.6¢ per meal, a 1.2-million-meal IMB-funded escalation at 3.0¢ per meal, and ultimately a 6,000-metric-ton vessel worth more than $8 million to Chongjin — in active consortium with World Vision, Mercy Corps, CARE, and Catholic Relief Services.
This is the chapter that establishes Amigos Internacionales as a documented PVOC-era (Private Voluntary Organization Consortium) humanitarian actor with USAID/USDA-funded standing, not just a narrative presence in a memoir. Baptist Press named Amigos by name. The work was real.
Chapter 19 is the opening chapter of the longest single ministry arc in the entire memoir (Chapters 19–23 are all North Korea). It is also the strongest direct Amigos Internacionales documentary record in the repository.
This is the chapter in which Amigos as a legal entity becomes named in a contemporary primary source as the coordinator of an $8 million humanitarian operation — in active consortium with World Vision, Mercy Corps, CARE, and Catholic Relief Services. A small Texas-based nonprofit named by Baptist Press as coordinator of an $8M+ consortium vessel because its leverage and trust were higher than its budget.
"Culturally and linguistically I was utterly unequipped for North Korea — yet the burden would not lift." Dr. John LaNoue, Walking with God in Broken Places, Chapter 19. The closed-country calling is not a vocational extrapolation. It is an imposition. Chapter 19 documents what happens when obedient people follow that imposition into the most hostile political environment on earth.
Dr. John LaNoue — TBM Agricultural, Aviation, and Hispanic Fellowships director; spent 3 months inside North Korea in 1997 as Amigos Internacionales representative; initiator of the Breedlove container program; organizer of the Chongjin vessel consortium.
Dr. Ken Dupuy — Amigos Internacionales VP, Longview, Texas; named directly in Baptist Press January 22, 1999; former Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury; holder of Presidential Commendations from Carter, Nixon, Ford, and Reagan. Dupuy's call to Dr. John about the USAID/WFP American-monitors gap initiated the Washington trip documented in Chapter 20.
Dewayne Williams — Retired USDA soil scientist; Agricultural Fellowship member; made the first Southern Baptist soil-testing trip to North Korea; designed a complete portable soil-testing laboratory in waterproof and chemical-proof containers.
Powell Adams — Lubbock, Texas wheat/cotton/corn farmer; Breedlove Foods board member; began a 14+ year DPRK tenure that eventually brought him into rooms with Kim Jong Il and Cabinet-level ministers.
Bob Dixon — TBM Executive Director; assigned the Korean Baptist Men's Fellowship NK request to LaNoue's Agricultural Fellowship; the original operational decision that started the entire NK arc.
David L. Miller — Founder and CEO of Breedlove Foods, Lubbock, Texas; agreed to produce at-cost dehydrated soup mix; first international Breedlove shipment went to North Korea in 1997.
John Bullock — TBM Royal Ambassador program director; designed the NK shoulder patch; mobilized thousands of Texas Baptist boys to raise hunger-fund contributions for North Korea.