Oh, we're thrilled to death with the Halifax class modernization. It is moving very quickly toward full-up success in so many different ways. The capacities of new technology undoubtedly give you more capability than you had in older systems.
The number of ships is a quality in its own right, and we will see the number of our ships repair fairly quickly with the delivery of a whole new class of ships called the arctic offshore patrol ships or the Harry DeWolf class. This is going to push the Canadian navy fully as a partner into the Arctic domain.
We've come through a period of difficult sailing with our submarine fleet, and we are well on our way to operating three submarines, because we've committed the resources, talent, and intellect in our training with allies to generate them to high readiness.
Regrettably, we've laid up three of our ships which thrilled the heck out of us in our operational life over 40-plus years, and we couldn't have asked them to do more. We are sad for the sailors who put so much into them, but our navy is transitioning very quickly to the modernized Halifax class, working with a modernized air force. We can see in the front windshield the Cyclone coming at us. We believe in our submarines like nobody else, and we are being asked to participate in international operations because we still have effect and relevance.
I would say, sir, that we've taken the back end of the business and given it a strong shaking. We call it “evolving the business of our business”. We've emptied out all the ways we've done business. We've thrown all the Scrabble pieces on the floor, and we've rewritten doctrine, policy, and planning in the Royal Canadian Navy to always prioritize the generation of the fleet. Maybe we've kicked ourselves about the way we used to do things in our schoolhouses, the way we ran our governance, and how we had different people doing the same thing, and we got it down to as lean as we can to bridge to this period of the modernized fleet.