A woman leans against the colonnade of the Museum of the Great Patriotic War (also known as the Victory Museum ) – the largest museum of military history in Russia at Poklonnaya Hill in Moscow on August 18, 2023. (Photo by Natalia Kolesnikova/AFP Photo)

World War Two veteran Abla Begaliyev, 91, is seen in an undated handout picture (L), poses for a picture in Arashan (Top R) and at home in Kyrgyzstan April 14, 2015. Begaliyev served in the border guard cavalry from February 1942 until April 1947. Originally from Kyrgyzstan, he fought on the Ukrainian front and relocated to the border with Afghanistan at the end of World War Two. As the world marks the 70th anniversary of the end of World War Two, Reuters photographers the length and breadth of the former Soviet republics (CCCP) captured portraits of Red Army veterans, mostly now in their 80s and 90s, today and through archive pictures at the time. More than 20 million Soviet citizens were killed in the war. (Photo by Vladimir Pirogov/Reuters/Family handout (L))

Members of the 1st Tennessee wait to take part in in a demonstration of a battle during ongoing activities commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg, Friday, June 28, 2013, at at Bushey Farm in Gettysburg, Pa. Union forces turned away a Confederate advance in the pivotal battle of the Civil War fought July 1-3, 1863, which was also the war's bloodiest conflict with more than 51,000 casualties. (Photo by Matt Rourke/AP Photo)

Police, bystanders and soldiers aid a fallen soldier at the War Memorial as police respond to an apparent terrorist attack on October 22, 2014 in Ottawa, Canada. A gunman is believed to have shot a soldier as he was standing guard at the National War Memorial in Ottawa. It is believed police then chased the man into the main parliament building at Parliament Hill, where more shots were fired. (Photo by Wayne Cuddington/Postmedia/Barcroft Media/ABACAPress)

Russian soldiers dressed in Red Army World War II uniforms attend a rehearsal for the Nov. 7 parade in the Red Square with Spassky Tower in the background, in Moscow, Russia, Friday, November 6, 2015. The parade marks the 74th anniversary of a November 7 parade on Red Square when soldiers went directly to the front during World War II. For decades Nov. 7 was a holiday celebrating the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution. (Photo by Ivan Sekretarev/AP Photo)

Girls dressed in Soviet WWII uniforms of traffic control officers as Russian President Vladiimir Putin lays a wreath in the Hall of Military Glory of the Mamayev Kurgan memorial complex commemorating the Battle of Stalingrad to mark the 75th anniversary of the victory in the battle in Volgograd, Russia on February 2, 2018. The battle between Nazi troops and the Soviet Army was a major pivotal moment in the Great Patriotic War and World War II. (Photo by Mikhail Metzel/TASS via Getty Images)

A US Marine feeds an orphan kitten found after a heavy mortar barrage near “Bunker Hill” during the Korean War. (Photo by Sgt Martin Riley/Getty Images). 1953

“Michael Mathias Prechtl (April 26, 1926, Amberg – March 19, 2003, Nuremberg) was a German artist, illustrator and cartoonist. He served as a soldier on the Eastern Front during World War II and spent 1945-49 as a prisoner of war in the Soviet Union”. – Wikipedia

Photo: “Der Gestiefelte Kater (Puss in Boots)”, 1997. Artwork by Michael Mathias Prechtl