That is patently pansyish and anti-American. He suggesting that we ought to have operated in the Pacific at the pleasure of Japanese militarists. Japan's oil? Come now. It's not their oil till they take possession of it. Roosevelt, in one of his rare lucid foreign policy moments, tried to cripple Japan's war machine, at a time when their claws had already extended far past their own borders or even any conceivably justifiable buffer zone.
With regard to the courage comment, I may have been off base. But Pat is clearly taking the anti-American line trumpeted by so many Japanese history professors when he speaks of WWII.
Yes. It's in Republic not an Empire, and I actually agree with his argument, which I suspect you have not read since your account of it is highly characatured.
Up until late 1941, Japan was not doing anything to threaten us. They were, in fact, going out of their way to avoid conflict with us. They were targeting China as well as Dutch, French, and English colonies. FDR imposed an oil embargo in July 1941 in response to Japan's invasion of French Indochina.
This would have destroyed Japan since they had no oil reserves of their own, so the Japanese sent diplomats to Washington to get FDR to lift the embargo. They offered all kinds of concessions to FDR, including withdrawal form many places they invaded, including I believe French Indo-China. FDR refused to compromise. The Japanese concluded they could not avoid war with us, so they attacked.
This is not an anti-American analysis. It's an anti-FDR analysis, who I believe is the worst persident in history.