When NATO aircraft blasted the chemical industry in Pancevo, a town 12 miles from Belgrade, Zarije Kornel, a local opposition politician, remembers watching a terrified mother run from a sheet of toxic smoke. Cradling a child in her arms, the young women fled into woods, but the poisonous cloud followed her.
"How can I explain to her that the West, which caused this, is on her side?" Kornel asks.
It's a question that is not easy to answer, and yet it is crucial to both Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic and Serbian opposition leaders as vital elections approach. These polls must be held by October, according to the Yugoslav constitution, and could take place as early as May. The results may determine Milosevic's fate.
After 78 days of NATO airstrikes, and a winter made harder by Western sanctions, there is little support for the West in Serbia. "If the West had wanted to make Milosevic suffer, it has failed," says Zivko Tornjanski (53), a quiet, hard-working metal worker who makes drain pipes in his garage.
"Milosevic is not struggling. He lives well and has money. We are the ones who suffer," says Zivko, who lost his job at Pancevo's aircraft factory three years ago when Western sanctions imposed in the early 1990s began to bite. His wife, Jelena (52) an economist, has been without work for eight months.
Nationalist sentiment thrives in this environment. Immediately after the bombing of Yugoslavia, many people began to say openly they blamed Milosevic for 10 years of suffering and for the NATO air strikes. But the difficult winter appears to have reversed some of these sentiments.
President Milosevic is playing on this. His speech at the Socialist Party Congress last month talked of local governments that are "branch offices of some Western governments that took part in the bombing of Serbia". His words strike a chord in an already fearful population, for in cafes and street corners across the country, against the background of radio reports of NATO's Kosovo exercises, the only conversation is how long it will be before NATO bombs again.
The turnaround in President Milosevic's fortunes is remarkable. By the end of June last year he had surrendered Serbia's religious heartland of Kosovo, lost the war and looked a defeated man. Roads, railway lines and bridges lay in ruins, discontent was rife and demonstrations rocked the provinces.
The collapse of his regime seemed inevitable - but it did not happen. "I believe the regime will win the elections," says one Belgrade taxi driver. "I have always been anti-Communist, but I do not see this government being defeated now."
As the local poll deadline approaches, repression increases - all part of a deliberate strategy. In the last two weeks, seven opposition-owned local television or radio stations have been attacked, reducing the access of people in Serbia's heartland to non-government information.
"Independent media are being shut down. Mobilisation is in progress. Voter registration lists are being forged. Local elections will be called under these conditions," warns Vladan Batic, co-ordinator of the opposition umbrella grouping, Alliance for Change.
Legislation put in place over recent years has strengthened President Milosevic's hand. A university law has made appointment of academics dependent more on party loyalty than intellectual merit. The aim is to undermine a natural centre of revolt.
Dissenting judges have been reined in, newspapers are subject to escalating printing and paper costs, and a rigorous information law is used to levy punitive fines.
But President Milosevic's survival is also due to the failure of opposition leaders. After months of fighting, they finally agreed a January 10th pact on unity - but they have spent the last month squabbling over the date of a planned Belgrade rally and who will have the chance to speak.
Prof Vladmimir Goati, from the Belgrade Institute for Social Studies, criticises them for poor leadership. "There is a conflict between the regime and civil society going on in Serbia at the moment - and the opposition is acting as an observer," he says.
Last winter, against all odds, Serbia did not fall to its knees. In the cold months that followed the bombing, the country's skilled engineers repaired the electricity transmission system and most people had heat, light and power, virtually without a break.
Serbia was backed by a new ally, China. Beijing reportedly provided Milosevic with $300 million in December and the Yugoslav Chamber of Commerce says Yugoslavia's oil debt to China, up to January, was $195 million.
The Milosevic regime is embattled but is continuing the fightback it started last autumn. Before that, a European Union list of party stalwarts issued last summer blocked visas to Milosevic cronies. Analysts began to talk of a possible palace coup. Long-time loyalists were whispered to be talking to the West.
Businessman Boguljub Karic, owner of a Belgrade-based, pro-Milosevic TV station, moved to pro-West Mongenegro. Even Serbian President Milan Milutinovic was reported to be under house arrest. But then Milosevic reasserted his grip.
The public announcement of Milosevic's indictment for war crimes has dramatically sharpened the lines of conflict. It has ratcheted the pressure higher and curtailed his ability to travel - now he dare not set foot in Kosovo or Montenegro for fear of arrest.
But announcing the Hague charges carries a major risk. Prof Gaso Knezevic, an anti-Milosevic lawyer and a member of the opposition Civic Alliance, says it has left Milosevic with no escape.
"Milosevic knows that if the opposition gains power, he will be sent to the Hague. So he can't stay here and he can't go abroad. He has nowhere to go. And because of this, I think there is a possibility of civil war."
Now spring is arriving, bringing with it border tension. The southern boundary with Kosovo and the border with Serbia's sister state, Montenegro, are both heating up. The atmosphere in Belgrade is uneasy and tense, an unruly chaos threatens.
In southern Serbia, armed Albanian extremists from Kosovo are moving onto Serbian territory from NATO-controlled Kosovo, threatening a new conflict that could draw NATO into war.
Within the federation, Serbia is tightening the screw on Montenegro, blocking cross-border trade and squeezing the economy of its sister republic, because of the desire for independence of its pro-Western president, Milo Djukanovic.
One Western diplomat suggests President Milosevic may try to fudge the elections, for if these elections are scheduled, the stand-off between Serbia and Montenegro will be forced into the open, threatening a new war.
So, one year after the bombing, Slobodan Milosevic is dug in for the fight of his life. The price of power for him has, for 10 years, been the blood of Yugoslavia's people and the loss of territory. The elections will be telling, for in these desperate times, Milosevic has less and less to lose.