Task Force 17 Task Force 17 Task Force 17 (TF17) was an aircraft carrier task force of the United States Navy during the Pacific Campaign of World War II. TF17 participated in several major carrier battles in the first year of the war. TF17 was initially centered around . With "Yorktown", TF17 engaged Imperial Japanese Navy forces in actions at the Marshalls-Gilberts raids, Invasion of Lae-Salamaua, Battle of the Coral Sea, and the Battle of Midway. "Yorktown" was sunk at Midway. Reformed around and commanded by RADM George Murray, TF17 supported Allied forces during the Guadalcanal Campaign. At the Battle of the Santa
Naval tactics in the Age of Steam each based around a single carrier. Through a series of raids on Japanese-held islands, the American gradually grew more confident in their handling of aircraft carriers, learning that the right place for the task force commander was aboard a carrier, not one of the escorting cruisers, and developing tactics like having a single fighter direction officer for task forces operating in company. The four great carrier battles of 1942 – Coral Sea, Midway, Eastern Solomons and Santa Cruz – were all fought by aircraft without the ships on either side actually coming in sight of one another. The Japanese carriers