Axis Of Evil: North Korean arms bound for the Islamic Republic of Iran in violation of U.N. sanctions were intercepted, but Tehran will still be the first nuclear terror regime. No wonder Dick Cheney wanted to attack.

The United Arab Emirates' seizure of a French-owned ship transporting 10 containers of North Korean-made explosives, rocket-launched grenades and other arms disguised as oil equipment to Iran is a welcome confirmation that the Muslim Middle East recognizes the Islamofascist threat in its midst.

Disturbingly, however, it also confirms that the axis of evil that aligns North Korea, Iran and other bloodthirsty regimes against the U.S. and the rest of the free world is alive and well.

With its people destitute, Pyongyang has better things to do than manufacture bombs and send them halfway around the world. Yet encouraging jihadists to mass murder Americans and other Westerners obviously ranks far above feeding hungry multitudes on its list of priorities.

And while this ship may have been caught, how many others have made it through? It's barely 21/2 months since the U.N. Security Council passed its resolution requiring the interdiction of cargo coming in or going out of North Korea suspected of containing arms, nuclear equipment or missile-related materials.

It may be true that the United Nations is finally beginning to wake up to the threat of terror states working together, but is it too late?

Its International Atomic Energy Agency, self-styled global "watchdog" against nuclear proliferation, talks tougher on Iran in its latest confidential report. Reuters obtained a copy, and the news agency reports that Iran has increased its total number of installed uranium centrifuges by 1,000 to more than 8,300.

What that means is that the extended hand of President Obama, who had been offering Tehran an opportunity for direct talks, has been spat at, bitten and kicked aside. So much for the magic of "tough diplomacy."

Iran now apparently has more than 1,500 kilograms of low-enriched uranium, up by nearly 200 kilograms since May. And although IAEA inspectors were allowed to visit Iran's heavy-water reactor facility in Arak this month for the first time in a year, the report seemed to indicate that it might be the last inspection there. Tehran is also refusing to give the U.N. agency design information regarding Arak.

The Arak facility, which could end up producing plutonium for atomic weapons, is now hidden from satellite surveillance by a newly-completed roof.

No wonder former Vice President Cheney was counseling President George W. Bush to launch a U.S. attack on Iran to destroy its widely dispersed nuclear program.

Asked by Fox News Sunday if he considered a mistake for the Bush administration "not to go after the nuclear infrastructure of Iran," especially knowing how reluctant an Obama would be to take such action if he was elected, Cheney said that while "we do not know how it is ultimately going to come out," he believed it to be "very important that the military option be on the table."

"Negotiations could not possibly succeed unless the Iranians really believed we were prepared to use military force," Cheney said, pointing up the obvious.

Like Cheney, we have for years strongly advocated what he describes as a "more robust policy" toward the terror state of Iran. It's a policy that now looks a lot smarter than the one that's been embraced: depending on diplomats to save the day.