The correct answer is A) Japan needed resources for industry.
The reason why the Japanese wanted to create an Empire in the East was that Japan needed resources for industry.
The Japanese Army invaded Manchuria on September 18, 1931. That was the beginning of a Japanese idea that an empire in the East was the answer to get resources for industry. Then they had the Marco Polo Bridge incident with China in Pekin, in 1937. After that, the China incident in 1938 and the Japanese idea of the creation of a new order in East Asia, until the declaration of the Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere, the Japanese had the aim of the creation of an empire that dominated the region.
