JOHNSTOWN -- "Office of Congressman Murtha, can you hold, please?"

"Office of Congressman Murtha, can you hold, please?"

"No, he's in Washington. Mm-hmm. I will definitely let him know you called on that. You're welcome, sir."

The main district office of U.S. Rep. John P. Murtha, D-Johnstown, received a blizzard of faxes, e-mails and phone calls yesterday, following the lawmaker's call for a prompt pullout of American troops from Iraq, saying the conflict cannot be won militarily.

As local television news cameras came and went, and staffers lined up appearances for their boss on "Meet the Press" and "Hardball," the receptionist at Mr. Murtha's Johnstown office fielded one call after another, marking a two-column tally of the public's response, for and against, on a sheet of paper. According to district director Brad Clemenson, the nationwide response was running about 2-to-1 in support of Mr. Murtha, a decorated war veteran and Democratic hawk.

Mr. Murtha has been known as a strong advocate for military personnel, veterans in particular, said Mr. Clemenson. The tables in his office were piled with issues of Purple Heart magazine and Jane's Defence Weekly.

In and around Johnstown, with its heavily Democratic but generally conservative voters, reaction to Mr. Murtha's speech was positive.

Terry Hildebrand returned to Johnstown from Iraq six months ago. A sergeant with the Pennsylvania Army National Guard's 876th Engineer Battalion, Mr. Hildebrand worked in Baghdad, "searching out and disarming landmines."

These days, he does maintenance for the Cambria County Transit Authority; his unit is still deployed in Iraq.

Mr. Hildebrand said he doesn't like to talk about his time over there. He went to Iraq thinking the war was a mistake, and came back knowing it.

"I think our boys should come back," he said. "[President] Bush, he's not doing right."

To many of his constituents, Mr. Murtha is a hero who deserves their trust, both for his military service and for all the jobs he has brought to the district.

"Those congressmen don't care if our guys are over there getting killed, but John Murtha does," said Robert Kuzminsky, of Richland, Cambria County, who operates a swimming pool company. "We ought to listen to him; he's a very smart man. If it wasn't for John Murtha, you know what this town would be right now? Nothing."

In a city that relied on the steel industry for decades of employment, Johnstown faced huge pressures when mills began closing in the early 1980s. Interest rates climbed to higher than 20 percent and unemployment almost reached levels only ever seen during the Great Depression. The city's population dropped by some 35,000 and family-sustaining jobs were hard to come by.

But Congressman Murtha helped turn that tide around. With his influence, Cambria County and the surrounding area have turned into a corridor for high-tech jobs and defense industries. Almost everyone here attributes that success to him.

Mary Jane Kuffner Hirt, a political science professor at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, called Mr. Murtha's actions this week courageous.

"He has made public service his career, his passion," she said.

Though the congressman may risk losing support of some people by changing his mind and speaking out against the war, Professor Hirt doubts it will be much.

"I don't think he's going to turn many of his constituents off or many of his colleagues off by what he said," she said. "I think he's studied the situation and his conscience is telling him there's something terribly wrong."

Charles Vizzini, an Army veteran from World War II, has campaigned for Mr. Murtha since back when he was a state representative.

"He's a great man, Jack is," Mr. Vizzini said.

He agrees with his old friend's statements this week and was proud of him for making them.

"I think they've been there long enough," said Mr. Vizzini, 81, of Ebensburg. "We're losing too many boys over there."

On Wednesday, Mr. Murtha concluded his speech by saying, "Our military has done everything that has been asked of them, the U.S. can not accomplish anything further in Iraq militarily. It is time to bring them home."

It is a sentiment echoed by retired construction worker John Ondrusko, of Johnstown. In the beginning, Mr. Ondrusko supported the war, as did Mr. Murtha. But the mounting U.S. casualties have convinced him that our troops "don't have a chance over there."

"These terrorists, they blow themselves up," he said. "They don't care! It's not like other wars."