Out in the provinces they may even believe it.But Milosevic will have to reconfigure his regime. The ultra-nationalists of Vojislav Seselj's Radical party and the Serbian Orthodox Church must go But new partners must come on board. Step forward the secular socialists of YUL (United Yugoslav Left), a party run by Milosevic's wife, Mirjana, and maybe even Vuk Draskovic, the eccentric leader of the Serbian Renewal Movement, chucked out of the Serbian government at the start of the war for his doveish statements.For all the rumours of military coups and talk of popular disillusion, there is no obvious replacement for the man whose 12 years as leader have seen Serbia dragged ever deeper into an abyss. His rivals inside Serbia are a group of envious, quarrelsome political dwarfs, and while they complain about his disasters, none ever suggested following a different course in Croatia, Bosnia or Kosovo.Don't expect a revolt from within the ranks of the security forces either. The army may be seething but the real power in Serbia is Milosevic's large, well-armed paramilitary police.

This is the regime's Preatorian guard and it will sink or swim with its paymaster.Perhaps the biggest threat to Milosevic comes from the unlikely quarter of Montenegro, Serbia's junior partner in Yugoslavia He ought to have crushed that nut when he had the chance. Now he must endure Montenegro's youthful president, Milo Djukanovic, lecturing him about how stupid he was to take on Nato in the first place. Djukanovic plays with the idea of taking Montenegro out of Yugoslavia. But he may decide the stay, now the Serbs are humbled, and angle for the post of Yugoslav president himself.. PERHAPS THE diplomats in European capitals were sipping champagne No one here would begrudge them that.

But a day after the much-heralded Kosovo peace agreement, things on the ground along the Kosovo-Albanian border had changed little Nato warplanes continued to bomb Kosovo. Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) fighters continued to engage in close-range combat with Serb forces in border villages near the Albanian frontier, showing no sign of giving up their weapons or their struggle. But most of all, the refugees themselves continued to live in squalor They were optimistic, as always, but realistic, too. Not a single one of them would give a deutschmark for Slobodan Milosevic's signature. And few of them expect to be back in their homeland this year. They want to see real Nato soldiers here - and they want to see them soon.KLA spokesmen moved to reassure them that they would provide the backbone of a new army and police force for the province.

One KLA man, Kadri Kryeziu, promised big changes when the Serb forces leave. "We will have a new constitution that will guarantee the human rights of everyone, regardless of ethnic origin, creed or colour. Serbs who didn't support Milosevic's fascism will have their security and rights guaranteed."Almost in the next breath, however, Mr Kryeziu predicted that "100 per cent of the Serbs will leave Kosovo when Milosevic falls".The aid effort would have to be massive and quick he said, but promised: "Kosovars have a culture of hard work We will rebuild Under the Serbs, they controlled us. In my city, Prizren, there were 95 per cent Albanians and 5 per cent Serbs But they controlled everything. If your Serb neighbour wasn't with the Serb secret police, his sister was."Now, we will rebuild a new country in freedom, better than before We have a land rich in natural resources.