In the Tajik-controlled areas of northern Afghanistan, there are posters everywhere of the recently assassinated Northern Alliance general Ahman Shah Masood.
Masood was killed in a suicide- bomb attack at his base in the Amu Darya valley two days before the terrorist strikes on the United States and his supporters are still grieving their hero. Speeches from his funeral blare daily from village loudspeakers.
Three weeks ago, Masood and his coalition were virtually unknown to the outside world. But now the focus is firmly on the Northern Alliance, which carries the ambitions of the US-led coalition to end the six-year reign of Afghanistan's ruling Taliban.
The Northern Alliance is made up of ethnically and religiously disparate rebel groups, united only in their desire to release the Taliban's grip on their country. Unlike any US special forces troops which may land in Afghanistan to fight the Taliban, the hardened alliance soldiers know this tough, punishing terrain like the back of their hands.
The Masood-inspired alliance is made up of a core of 15,000 Tajik and Uzbek troops and has been fighting the Taliban since the fundamentalist Islamic regime swept to power in Kabul in 1996.
It controls only 5 per cent of Afghanistan: the north-eastern stronghold of Badakhshan, the eastern Takhar province, the Panjshir Valley and part of the Shomail plain north of Kabul.
Masood's assassination might well have spelled the end of the alliance if the bombing of the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon had not inspired US moves to take military action against Osama bin Laden and his Taliban backers.
Morale in the alliance has been boosted and its political leaders are confident that their enemy will be eliminated. They have stated that they are willing to fight alongside the US against the Taliban.
In the last two weeks, Washington has increased contacts with the alliance as it contemplates military strikes against the Taliban and their "guest", bin Laden.
The alliance's main military force was Masood, the legendary Tajik commander who successfully brought together Taliban opponents. He was by far the most visible figure in the alliance until his death. His main base was in the Panjsher valley, north of Kabul, where he first fought the Soviet Union and then the Taliban.
A man of great charisma, his death has galvanised his supporters. Militia at the front still refer to themselves as Masood's forces and their territory as Masood's.
His successor, Gen Mohammed Fahim, has avoided the spotlight and is far less well known. He was previously in charge of security for the alliance government.
The Tajiks are joined by militias representing smaller ethnic groups in isolated pockets of the country, most notably that of the ethnic Uzbek warlord, Gen Abdul Rashid Dostum, based south of the strategic city of Mazar-i-Sharif.
Gen Dostum once worked with Soviet forces against Masood but joined him in the alliance earlier this year. His forces are currently leading an assault on Mazar-i Sharif, the first major alliance offensive since Masood's killing and the World Trade Centre attacks.
The alliance represents the government that the Taliban drove from Kabul in 1996 and is still recognised by the United Nations.
Alliance leaders say they oppose the Taliban's strict enforcement of its interpretation of Islam. They are historical rivals of the Taliban's Pashtun ethnic community but claim they would seek to build an inclusive state if the Taliban is toppled.
The president of the alliance government and its nominal head is Burnahuddin Rabbani, who was locked in a power struggle with ethnic Pashtun rivals for control of the country in the early 1990s, before the Taliban's rise.
The alliance's implacable enemy is Pakistan, which it blames for creating the Taliban and imposing it on Afghanistan. Pakistan, in turn, opposes international support for the alliance.
While the alliance receives widespread support around the world, its most vocal backing comes from Moscow, Masood's one-time bitter enemy.
Russia, which accuses the Taliban of exporting Islamic extremism to Chechnya and other parts of the former Soviet Union, has pledged humanitarian and diplomatic support. Last week President Putin said he was ready to help arm Northern Alliance forces.
Former Soviet neighbours Tajikistan and Uzbekistan also support the Northern Alliance, sharing Russia's security concerns as well as ethnic ties with Uzbek and Tajik Afghans. Iran supports the alliance and also has ethnic ties to the Tajiks. Pakistan's historical rival, India, backs the alliance and accuses the Taliban of aiding guerrillas in Kashmir.
It is not known how well armed the alliance is. In the Panjsher valley and on the front north of Kabul, the alliance has scores of tanks and armoured troop carriers, trophies of the war against the Soviet Union. But it is not known how many are in working order.
Despite sharing the same goal, the alliance is still wary of the US and is bitter that it did not support them against the Taliban in 1996, despite mujahideen resistance to the Soviet 1979-1989 invasion.
On this occasion the alliance is hoping that Washington will provide it with logistical support and military supplies and that US air and missile strikes will cripple the Taliban.
The White House press spokesman, Mr Ari Fleischer, did not rule out active co-operation on the ground last week. He said the US welcomed the efforts of the Northern Alliance and anybody else to put an end to those who sponsor terrorism.
The Northern Alliance is not automatically considered a potential government for all of Afghanistan unless it broadens its base. But that will be a problem for another day.