The title is taken from a column by James Fallows in The Atlantic. In effect he asks Americans and those in power to ponder upon:
In the face of evil we should do something, except when the something would likely make a bad situation worse.
Link:http://www.theatlantic.com/internati...-syria/279086/

In the UK little mention has been made of the Kosovo air campaign in 1999, unlike what appears via my Twitter feed from the USA. Perhaps PM David Cameron will "sing the same tune" on Thursday, as Parliament has been recalled to debate what next.

Fallows cites a linked article that looks at Kosovo, which has a telling passage:
That the NATO alliance of 780 million people eventually prevailed over Serbia, a country of ten million with a gross domestic product equal to two-thirds that of Fairfax County, Virginia, is hardly a precedent to celebrate, particularly since it proved so spectacularly that the marriage of coercive diplomacy to limited precision bombardment is a colossal failure.
From:http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/08/...the-crosshair/