Foreign policywise, President Bush is batting in a sticky wicket.

Secretary of State Colin Powell delivered the American indictment of Iraq at the United Nations, connecting Iraq to Al Qaeda, masterminds of the aerial ambuscade on Sept. 11, 2001. The intelligence data were somewhat surprising, and bundled with the expected train of charges about Iraq’s “weapon of mass destruction” and obfuscatory intrigues.

But lo and behold, North Korea begins thundering about reviving its moribund nuclear program, daring us to stop it.

Two questions: Why haven’t we attacked Iraq already, or at least the Al Qaeda terrorists hiding there, given what we did to Afghanistan in the wake of Sept. 11? And what is in store for North Korea?

As to the first, Powell disclosed some interesting intelligence:

“Iraq today harbors a deadly terrorist network headed by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, an associate and collaborator of Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda lieutenants…. When our coalition ousted the Taliban, the Zarqawi network helped establish another poison and explosives training center camp.

“The network is teaching its operatives how to produce ricin and other poisons…. Baghdad has an agent in the most senior levels of the radical organization, Ansar al-Islam…. In 2000 this agent offered Al Qaeda safe haven in the region…. [S]ome of its members accepted this safe haven. They remain there today…. Last year, an Al Qaeda associate bragged that the situation in Iraq was, quote, ‘good.’

Apparently, we’ve known this for some time. If what Powell says is true, certainly we would have been justified in doing to Iraq what we did to Afghanistan, international approval regardless.

Yet just as Powell arrived at the U.N., North Korea dropped this payload: It has restarted its nuclear program, and American officials believe it will produce atom bombs.

Red Korea’s communist party newspaper has promised “total war” if the United States attacks, an uninviting prospect. According to the New York Times, 80 percent of North Korea’s 1.1 million troops are within 50 miles of the border with South Korea. Seoul would be destroyed in an artillery attack.

That said, our defense minister, Donald Rumsfeld, says the “terrorist regime” ruling North Korea is “involved in things that are harmful to other countries.”

“Terrorist regime?”

“Things that are harmful to other countries?”

This is what we say of Iraq, so Rumsfeld’s remarks lead to an ineluctable conclusion: Now we must plan for war with North Korea.

Of course, we would hear the obligatory and fulsome U.N. poppycock, along with another indictment before the Security Council. And the arsenal of democracy must be deployed in and around Asia to prepare the juggernaut.

Point is, given the clearly stated American position on “terrorists” and “weapons of mass destruction,” the sauce for the Iraqi goose must be sauce for the North Korean gander.

It’s near impossible to imagine war with Red Korea. Or maybe not, given recent American bellicosity.

But it’s even harder to imagine China standing by while America pulverizes its friend. It didn’t the last time.

The original questions remain:

Granting Powell’s intelligence, why did we wait to punish Iraq for aiding and abetting the Sept. 11 murderers?

And if that punishment is imminent, after we destroy Iraq and install the occupation army, when does the second Korean War begin?

R. Cort Kirkwood is managing editor of the Daily News-Record in Harrisonburg, Va. His e-mail address is: [email protected].