Lexington and Saratoga prove battle and raiding doctrine

Once Lexington and Saratoga entered service, Fleet Problems could treat carriers as central actors. Battle doctrine aimed to locate and hit the enemy carrier first, while raiding doctrine used carrier mobility to strike far-apart targets and force bad defensive choices. A force that launched at one target, recovered while moving, and attacked elsewhere could threaten points hundreds of nautical miles apart within a day. That movement made defenders disperse patrol aircraft and other forces across several equally dangerous possibilities. Faster modern carriers and longer-ranged aircraft preserve the same problem even when satellites and other sensors improve the search. A raid can also serve as a feint that pulls defenders toward one apparent threat while the carrier moves to strike the real objective elsewhere. The Pacific setting matters because the US Navy was already thinking about Japanese carrier capability, wide-ocean maneuver, and the search problem created by mobile airfields at sea.