York's 2 Signal Regiment is in charge of all the telecommunications for Camp Bastion.

Their large well air-conditioned offices with flat screen computer monitors and fibre-optic broadband could be an office based in the UK.

Six plasma screens on the wall show the networks they monitor, both in camp and internationally.

Troops who have brought laptops or smart phones have wireless internet at their fingertips thanks to Paradigm cards issued to the forces to communicate with family and friends back home.

SIM cards are removed from mobile phones to prevent the enemy hacking people's personal information and targetting families back home.

There are phone and internet cabins troops can also access, except during Operation Minimise, when communications with the outside world are restricted while military authorities inform the family of a fallen soldier.

For a camp in the middle of the desert, this infrastructure is impressive.

I had expected the facilities to be more austere, rather like the single temperamental cable installed in the press tent.

But a sergeant major laughs when I speak of good facilities. The camp's international telecomms is state of the art, but the IT infrastructure in his office must be something like ours. Compared to Kabul, it's nothing, he says.

I speak to a young lad whose job it is to run the helpdesk. He's the IT guy, like in any other company, who gets the abuse when things go wrong.

There are signs on the door saying any person of any rank abusing staff will be asked to leave. He works long hours and misses his girlfriend terribly.

Another of the IT guys tells me he feels safe within Camp Bastion and says he's embarrassed when people consider him brave for serving in Afghanistan. He says he doesn't feel he deserves the medal bestowed upon him for his service out here.

This is a recurrent theme I get from some of the troops who stay in camp. Their jobs are mundane, they work hard and they miss home. And they seem to almost feel guilty they're not going out on the ground.

It's funny that the guys going out on the ground seem happier. Their jobs, while dangerous, are glamorous and exciting, and they wouldn't do anything else.