As the nation's security needs call for a growing naval fleet, the public private industrial base for construction and weapon system acquisition will be stressed to perform at a high level of operational excellence. Underperformance in defense acquisitions is found to be caused by complexity, uncertainty, and risk manifested through poor requirements that are unadaptable to the changing reality of the global security landscape. This thesis hypothesizes that use of model-based engineering (MBE) will enable the needed efficiency and responsiveness. This thesis demonstrates real-world and original examples of MBE consisting of digital tools motivated by the principles of traceability and high-velocity design iteration that collectively connect requirements to technical specifications in a model-centric format.