Last week we heard the news that the 100th British Soldier had been killed in Afghanistan this year. A terrible toll.

So I thought this an appropriate time to reflect on why we are in Afghanistan and whether the sacrifice of our brave troops is justified.

Since I have been MP we've had two 'war' votes in Parliament- the one on Iraq and the other on Afghanistan.
On Iraq I did not think we were personally threatened so I did not support the conflict and I resigned at the time as Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Attorney General.

On Afghanistan however I did back the United Nations mission although my conscience is constantly challenged as to whether we have done the right thing.

Let me tell you how I see it.

When we are under attack we, in my opinion, have to respond. There will also be situations where the evil is such that if we can change it by intervening we should do so.

For example, we did so in a very minor way in Sierra Leone; our troops arrived in Freetown and the rebels surrendered. Result. We did nothing in Rwanda and 3million died. Should we have? In Bosnia we intervened and probably the outcome was worthwhile.

But let's turn to Afghanistan and the UN mission.

There were twin objectives in the UN recommending military action:

a) Humanitarian - the need to remove the Taliban who had imposed authoritarian control over the nation. In particular oppressing women who were not allowed to be educated or take any part in society. Their cruel, fundamentalist atrocities towards their own people were outrageous.

b) The west had suffered from terrorism, not just 9/11 but attacks on other countries and citizens. With the support of the Taliban Al Qaeda were able to operate terrorist training camps throughout Afghanistan.

Associated with this are the problems of Pakistan and its tribal areas - the Taliban and Al Qaeda are engaging in terrorist activities. We must challenge that as the fall of that nation would be catastrophic given their nuclear arsenal.

The reasons for our ongoing intervention are complex and can often be hard to spot amongst the challenges we face but I believe they are just and should not be forgotten or ignored.

To keep up to date on what I'm doing stop by my website http://www.michaelfoster.org.uk/ .

You can also receive a monthly update on my activities by sending an email to mp@1066.net with 'MPFree' in the subject line.