The new structure, which includes the creation of an "Iraq Stabilization Group" that will be run by the national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, appears to be part of an effort to assert more direct control over events.

It comes at a moment when polls show that Americans are less confident of  President George W. Bush's foreign policy skills than at any time since the terrorist attacks two years ago. At the same time, Congress is using Bush's request for $87 billion to question the administration's failure to anticipate the violence in Iraq and the obstacles to reconstruction.

"This puts accountability right into the White House," a senior administration official said.

The reorganization, which aims to strengthen economic, political and counterterrorism efforts, was described in a confidential memorandum that Rice sent on Thursday to Secretary of State Colin Powell, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and the director of central intelligence, George Tenet.

The creation of the group grew out of frustration by Bush at the setbacks in Iraq and the absence of progress in Afghanistan. It is the closest the White House has come to an admission that its plans for nation-building in those countries have proven insufficient and that they were unprepared for the guerrilla war that has resulted. In Iraq, there have been more American deaths since the end of active combat than during the six weeks it took to take control of the country.

"The president knows his legacy, and maybe his re-election, depends on getting this right," another administration official said. "This is as close as anyone will come to acknowledging that it's not working."

Inside the State Department and in some offices in the White House, the decision to create the Stabilization Group has been interpreted as a direct effort to diminish the authority of the Pentagon and Rumsfeld in the next phase of the occupation. Senior White House officials denied that was the case, and said in interviews on Sunday that the idea was created by members of the National Security Council and embraced by Rumsfeld, who has been a lightning rod for criticism about poor postwar planning.

"Don recognizes this is not what the Pentagon does best, and he is, in some ways, relieved to give up some of the authority here," a senior official said, noting that L. Paul Bremer 3rd, the head of the allied provisional authority in Iraq, will still report to the Defense Department. One of Bremer's deputies will sit on the Stabilization Group, giving him a direct line outside the Pentagon.

Rumsfeld's spokesman, Lawrence DiRita, said Sunday night that Rumsfeld was "aware of the new approach" and noted that Bremer's "relationship with Rumsfeld remains unchanged."

If Rumsfeld is giving up some authority, administration officials say, so is Powell. The State Department has been in charge of the Afghan reconstruction effort, but the White House will assert control there.

"While the problems in Afghanistan are less complex," a senior official said, "the president wanted to know how come it took so long to get the highway under construction." That project has become symbolic of the slow pace of reconstruction, especially outside Kabul.

The creation of the Stabilization Group appears to give more direct control to Rice, one of the president's closest confidantes, who signed the memoranda announcing the new organization. For the first two and a half years of Bush's presidency, Rice, a former Stanford provost, often seemed hesitant to take a more active role, eschewing the kind of hands-on approach for which Henry Kissinger and other national security advisers were known, and viewing her job chiefly as providing quiet advice to Bush. Now, four of her deputies will run coordinating committees - on counterterrorism efforts, economic development, political affairs in Iraq and the creation of clearer messages to the media in the United States and in Baghdad.

Each working group will include under secretaries from the State, Defense and Treasury Departments, and senior representatives from the CIA.

State Department officials have complained bitterly that they have been shut out of decision-making about Iraq, even as attacks on American troops have increased, lights failed to go on and oil production remained stuck far below even prewar levels.

Asked about the reorganization on Sunday, Rice called it "a recognition by everyone that we are in a different phase now" that Congress is considering Bush's request for $20 billion for reconstruction and $67 billion for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. She said it was devised by herself, Vice President Dick Cheney, Powell and Rumsfeld after talks she held with Bush at his ranch in August.

Bush, a senior administration official said, made it clear that he wanted "all the powers of the government" turned toward making the reconstruction work in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

In the interview, Rice described the new organization as one intended to support the Pentagon, not supplant it.