Richard Nikolaus Eijiro, Graf von Coudenhove-Kalergi, one of the most influential and mischaracterized founders of the Pan-European Movement, was born in Tokyo in 1894, son of the Austrian-Hungarian Ambassador Heinrich von Coudenhove-Kalergi and Mitsuko Maria Aoyama...

a Japanese convert to Catholicism. The Coudenhove family were Flemish nobles who inherited the patrimony of the Greco-Venetian Kallegris, and Aoyama was the daughter of a moderately wealthy Japanese commoner. Richard was raised in Ronsperg, in the Austrian Crownland of Bohemia...

the second eldest of seven children, and was destined to follow his father into the diplomatic service. Though exempt from service due to his studies at the Theresianum, his first hand experience of the horrors of the first "European Civil War," and the growing menace of...

Soviet Russia convinced him of the necessity of Pan-European federal state, one capable of standing militarily and economically against Bolshevism. In 1923 he published 'Pan-Europa' and in 1925 his most controversial work, 'Practical Idealism'. This is the source of the...

infamous "Kalergi Plan" or "Great Replacement," the sole reason for which the Count is remember in "alt-right" circles, so let's take a moment to break it down. Inspired along similar lines as European conservatives Ernst Jünger
and Ernst von Starhemberg, Richard saw...

the "worker" as a bulwark against Communism and the future soldier in the battle for the salvation of Europe. Having already envisaged the disappearance of the nation-state in 'Pan-Europa,' and drawn in by the racial science of the time, he predicted the merging of Europeans...

Asians, and Africans into a single race of diverse individuals, as the natural outcome of historical trends. This prediction (not plan) does have some basis in reality, as Europe is defined by its constant influx of peoples, each adding a definite characteristic to European...

life, yet was overly "optimistic." A deeply religious man (yet an apparently apostate Catholic), C-K saw the necessity for a spiritual and intellectual leadership and he saw the quality of that leadership in the Jewish people he interacted with during his early life. His...

father had begun the work 'The Essence of Antisemitism' as an Anti-Semite, but his research soon led him to a profound respect for the Jewish people, a respect he would pass on to his son. Jews* and Jewish Converts such as Joseph Roth, Stefan Zweig, and Friedrich von Weisner...

formed the core and leadership of Vienna's Conservative Intellectual Elite. C-K had himself married Jewish actress Ida Roland in 1915, with the result of his mother banning him from family gatherings. In 1926, as a result of the increased popularity of 'Pan-Europa,' the first...

Pan-European Conference was held, and had the political support of Austrian Chancellor Ignaz Seipel and French Foreign Minister Edouard Herriot. C-K began to look for broader support elsewhere, and the authoritarian and Roman universalist language of Fascism appealed to him...

In 1927 after a falling out, he left the pseudo-Masonic Humanitas, which he joined in 1921, never to return to the Masons (though he kept friendly contacts with them). In 1932 at the 3rd P-E Congress, members of the Pan-European Youth Movement adopted aesthetically "fascist"...

uniforms, the "Blue Shirts" causing quite a scandal in Western Countries. In 1933, Hitler banned them as "un-German," and C-K, already friendly with the Dollfuß regime, sought an alliance with Hitler's main rival, Mussolini. Though visiting the dictator several times, and even...

being interviewed by noted 'superfascista' Julius Evola, Pan-European idealism made no headway with the National Populists of Italy. Thoroughly disillusioned with Fascism in 1937, he wrote "We are experiencing the most dangerous revolution in world history: the revolution of...

the State against man. We are experiencing the worst idolatry of all time: the deification of the state." Fleeing to the United States in 1940, throughout the war he advocated for the creation of a United European State, to prevent a return to the terrors of Nazism and...

to protect against the denigrating influences of Western Secularism and Soviet Atheism. It was during this crucial juncture that as far I as can make out, his collaboration with Archduke Otto von Habsburg truly began (much appreciated if anyone shares info on this subject)...

In post-war Europe, C-K never surrendered his Pan-European vision, despite the complete occupation of the eastern half of Europe by Communism. His movement shifted further to the Conservative Right while inspiring such politicians as Konrad Adenauer and Alcide De Gasperi...

and he often talked of restoring the patrimony of Charlemagne and the unity of Medieval Christendom. In 1967 he returned to Japan for the first time since childhood, where he was awarded the 'First Order of the Sacred Treasure' by Emperor Hirohito. In 1970 he returned for the...

second and last time to his birthplace. In 1972, Richard Eijiro von Coudenhove-Kalergi died suddenly in Schruns, Austria. The official cause of his death is given as a stroke, though there is some speculation that his death was suicide. Otto von Habsburg took over leadership...

the Pan-European Movement, which continues to this day to promote a truly unified and Christian Europe of Fatherlands. But sadly, the main legacy in the modern world of this great man is that of the Nazi and Soviet propaganda, swallowed whole by the "Alt-Right," which seeks...

to portray him as the destroyer of the very Europe he spent his life serving.

Sources: 'The time and space of Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi’s Pan-Europe' Thorpe
'Alt-right Claims that would put the Soviets to shame' -de Bruin

'Reflections on Europe: Defining a Political Order in Time and Space' -Åke Persson
'Pan-Europa,' 'Practical Idealism,' and 'The Totalitarian State Against Man' - Coudenhove-Kalergi
'Uncrowned Emperor' -Gordon Brook-Shepherd

*Addendum: Yes, his movement was also financed by Louis de Rothschild, the Warburg Brothers, and Bernard Baruch, which certainly influenced his writings.