More From Murtha On Iraq

(CBS/AP)  The Pennsylvania congressman who has sparked a firestorm of controversy by calling for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq says Vice President Cheney will eventually agree with his position.

Cheney, meanwhile, has unleashed another salvo against critics, calling them "corrupt and shameless" for accusing the administration of twisting pre-war intelligence. However, he did say that Murtha is "a good man, a Marine" and a patriot."

But Murtha tells CNN that he's "trying to prevent another Vietnam," and predicted Cheney would eventually see it that way, too. Murtha contends the war "cannot be won on the ground."

The decorated Vietnam veteran says "the public turned against" the war before he called for a U.S. withdrawal.

Cheney said Monday that criticism of the Iraq war is acceptable but that some Democratic senators were "dishonest and reprehensible" for suggesting that President Bush lied to the nation about the war.

At the same time, Cheney pressed the administration's high-voltage attack on war critics, particularly Senate Democrats who voted in October 2002 to give Mr. Bush authority to go to war in Iraq and who now oppose his policy, calling them "dishonest and reprehensible."

"The flaws in the intelligence are plain enough in hindsight. But any suggestion that prewar information was distorted, hyped or fabricated by the leader of the nation is utterly false," Cheney said.

Nevertheless, Democrats on Tuesday continued to counter the administration on Iraq. On The CBS Early Show, Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del.) said, "The fact of the matter is that the Vice President and the administration took the portion of the evidence that was questionable and offered it as if were a fact and I believe hyped the rationale to go to war."

As to proposals for a rapid pullout of U.S. troops, Cheney said, "It is a dangerous illusion to suppose that another retreat by the civilized world would satisfy the appetite of the terrorists and get them to leave us alone." Nearly 160,000 U.S. troops remain in Iraq.

Cheney ticked off a long list of terrorist attacks on American interests going back more than the two decades that preceded the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, including the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and earlier ones in Beirut, Saudi Arabia and Africa.

"Now they're making a stand in Iraq, testing our resolve, trying to intimidate the United States into abandoning our friends and permitting the overthrow of this new Middle Eastern democracy," Cheney said.

On Monday, Murtha defended his call to get out of Iraq, saying he was reflecting Americans' sentiment.

"The public turned against this war before I said it," Murtha said, speaking in his hometown of Johnstown, Pa. "The public is emotionally tied into finding a solution to this thing, and that's what I hope this administration is going to find out."

The Iraq debate turned more vitriolic in recent days, with the Senate voting overwhelmingly to require fuller reporting by the administration on progress, and by Murtha's proposal. That brought sharp criticism from the White House and led to a tumultuous late-night House floor fight when the GOP leaders forced a vote on an immediate pullout measure in hopes of trapping Democrats. It was rejected 403-3.

Meanwhile, troop levels will remain at their present levels as Iraqis prepare for elections Dec. 15, and will return to a baseline strength of 130,000 when the commanders there determine that conditions on the ground warrant it, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Sunday.

Some Republicans on Capitol Hill called Murtha's position one of abandonment and surrender and suggested that the decorated Marine Corps veteran and like-minded politicians were acting cowardly.

The administration has been toning down its criticism of Murtha since White House spokesman Scott McClellan derided him last week as an ultraliberal, likening him to activist far-left filmmaker Michael Moore.

Mr. Bush, who was returning Monday from a tour of Asia, praised Murtha as "a fine man" and said that disagreeing with the administration was not unpatriotic.

Rumsfeld, appearing on the Sunday morning news shows, acknowledged that questions about war ought to be debated, but he also warned that words have consequences for both the insurgents in Iraq and the U.S. troops opposing them.

"The enemy hears a big debate in the United States, and they have to wonder: 'Maybe all we have to do is wait and we'll win. We can't win militarily.' They know that. The battle is here in the United States," Rumsfeld said on "Fox News Sunday."