As ISIS charged toward Baghdad, Kurdish leaders last month sent a delegation to Washington to seek military assistance. The peshmerga are known for their professionalism and courage, but they need ammunition and artillery, better rifles, tanks, transportation vehicles and body armor. Obama Administration officials brushed them off, claiming American aid was tantamount to a green light to Kurdish independence and Iraq’s breakup.

This is the kind of crack strategic logic this Administration is famous for. Iraq is already on the verge of breaking up, and letting ISIS overrun the Kurds wouldn’t make it easier to keep together. If a unified Iraq is going to be saved, it will have to be done with the help of the Kurds. Vice President Joe Biden famously advocated the partition of Iraq into three countries, but the way to keep it together is with a loose federalism that gives the Kurdish, Sunni and Shiite regions considerable autonomy.

The U.S. has helped Taiwan defend itself for decades without endorsing independence. Providing military aid would give the U.S. more leverage with the Kurds to keep them in a confederated Iraq if that is still possible. Fuad Masum, a Kurd, was elected Iraq’s president last month. U.S. military aid for Kurdistan could even be tied to the region’s continued commitment to a single Iraq.