From my offical stand point, tell those people their offically retarded. No one owns anything beyond what they can maintain with their troops. Hell, you only -own- your own cities until someone decides they want them, and if you can't defend them, then their not yours anymore. They become the property of the person who destroyed your armies and took it.

That's my two cents on it, and any "offical" answer your going to get is going to be about the same, i'm sure.

This is a war game people.. come on.