 Over the course of seven hours there were coordinated Japanese attacks on the U.S.-held Philippines, Guam and Wake Island and on the British Empire in Borneo, Malaya, Singapore, and Hong Kong.The strategic goals of the offensive were to cripple the U.S. Pacific fleet, capture oil fields in the Dutch East Indies, and maintain their sphere of influence of China, East Asia, and also Korea.It was also to expand the outer reaches of the Japanese Empire to create a formidable defensive perimeter around newly acquired territory.