"They are all our inspiration," Haq says. "And soon, we'll be fighting alongside them."

Tens of thousands of students at Pakistan's 6,000 militant Muslim madrassas say they plan to go to Afghanistan to fight U.S. soldiers, attack bases in Pakistan that may host American forces, or conduct suicide bomb attacks against U.S. targets if President Bush launches military action against bin Laden and the ruling Taliban militia in Afghanistan.

Bush has named bin Laden the prime suspect in the attacks in the USA and is expected by many here to be preparing retaliatory strikes at him and the Taliban, which has been harboring him for years. But the madrassa students say any U.S.-led strikes won't stop the terrorism.

"We are all Osama bin Ladens," says Abdullah Shah, 35, senior teacher at Dar-ul-Alloon Sarhad, a nearby madrassa. "Getting rid of one Osama won't solve your problems. Your trouble is just beginning."

Already, more than 2,000 students, some carrying the Koran, Islam's holy book, and AK-47 assault rifles, have crossed into Afghanistan within the last week, Pakistani officials say.

More are on their way. Hundreds of others, who have been fighting Indian forces, are withdrawing from the Pakistani side of the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir. They also are heading for Afghanistan, Indian officials say.

Other madrassas, such as Haqquania here, are planning to shut down temporarily next week to allow their students to join the Taliban. Those who do go are being offered "extra credit."

"We give them the knowledge, the Taliban gives them the guns," Haq says. "I, and all my students, will support the Taliban and Osama at all costs. They are the only ones implementing true Islam."

Haq is believed to be one of bin Laden's closest friends in Pakistan, and Pakistani officials say he is a Taliban insider. He keeps three pictures atop his desk, and one in his wallet, all of which show him standing arm-in-arm with bin Laden. He says he uses a red "hotline" phone on his desk to call Taliban officials in the Afghan cities of Kabul and Kandahar.

"Osama and the Taliban are alive and well, thanks to God," Haq says.

He refuses to say when he last spoke with bin Laden and denies knowing where he is hiding. "Osama and the Taliban will not go lightly. They are preparing for a fight. That's where we come in."

USA TODAY was invited to spend a day at two of Pakistan's madrassas, one of them militant and the other moderate. The Islamic clerics who run the schools say they want to explain their anger to Americans before their jihad against the United States begins.

There are an estimated 40,000 madrassas in Pakistan, of which the government says 6,000 are militant. The madrassas, financed by wealthy businessmen in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and other countries, offer the best chance for an education for Pakistan's poor. Most government-run schools are overcrowded and underfunded and require students to pay for some costs. The madrassas do not charge tuition.

The students, most of whom are from Pakistan and Afghanistan, spend up to 6 hours a day memorizing the Koran. Then, they spend 2-4 hours listening to lectures about the Koran and the Islamic prophet Mohammed. Their curriculum includes some mathematics and geography but little else. Critics say the schools are teaching intolerance.

"These schools are providing an education which is basically unchanged from the 11th century," says Islamic analyst Pervez Hoodboy. He says they produce "a student with a particular mindset, one who does not question and who can be easily motivated into fighting to the death."

Pakistani officials, while insisting that militant Muslims represent only 15% of Pakistan's 140 million people, fear that the actions of the madrassa students could destabilize the government, which is led by a man who took power in a military coup 2 years ago. Fearing an uprising mobilized by the madrassas, the government has not cracked down on the schools.

"The biggest danger for Pakistan is from young, disillusioned and angry Pakistanis, many of them poor and jobless, who may be driven to join the radicals in a jihad," says former Pakistani army chief of staff Mirza Aslam Baig. "Some of the madrassas are breeding grounds for this radicalism."

Lately, lectures on the Koran at Haqquania and the moderate Dar-ul-Alloon Sarhad madrassa have given way to heated discussions about impending U.S. military action. Students and faculty at the madrassas demand that the United States make public the evidence it has proving bin Laden's involvement in the terrorist attacks earlier this month in the USA.

"How can you convict someone without presenting evidence or witnesses against the alleged culprit?" asks Khalid Ahmad Banouri, chancellor at Dar-ul-Alloon Sarhad. Surrounded by more than a dozen other Muslim clerics, he sits on a large Oriental carpet in a courtyard of the school. "It makes many Muslims believe that, despite what President Bush says, this attack will be on Muslims and Islam itself."

The expected assault on Afghanistan is just the latest act by the United States, Banouri says. He says America has implemented a foreign policy based on hypocrisy and self-serving interests:

• He ridicules U.S. support for Israel, which he accuses of brutalizing Palestinians and illegally occupying the West Bank of the Jordan River.

• He blasts U.S.-backed economic sanctions on Iraq, which he says are causing thousands of Iraqi women and children to starve to death.

• He and others here also are furious that Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has agreed to share intelligence on the whereabouts of bin Laden. And they are angry that Musharraf will allow U.S. fighters to fly through Pakistani airspace on their way to attack targets in Afghanistan.

At the Haqquania madrassa, a student who says he has just attended one of bin Laden's training camps pulls out a training manual, called the "encyclopedia," which U.S. officials say is used at the camps in Afghanistan. "Now listen, American, and listen well," says Hussain Zaeef, 21. He reads from Page 12 of the manual: " 'Bomb their embassies and vital economic centers.' That's what I will do to you and your country. I will get your children. I will get their playgrounds. I will get their schools, too. I will get all of you."

Tempers then flare. Several students begin yelling at once, pointing their fingers and gesturing wildly.

One yells out the name of Mohammed Atta, an alleged bin Laden associate believed to have hijacked one of the two jets that crashed into the World Trade Center. Another says he will "kill more than Atta."

A third student then unfolds a picture of the Sears Tower in Chicago. "This one is mine," he says.