Washington ? President Bush acknowledged Wednesday that the multibillion-dollar reconstruction of Iraq has “been uneven” and hobbled by corruption, misplaced priorities and insurgent attacks, but maintained that “quiet, steady progress” would ultimately transform the country.

In an unusually earnest assessment of the situation in Iraq, Bush described several strategic errors in managing a rebuilding effort that he said proceeded in “fits and starts.” By learning from its mistakes, Bush said, the administration has reshaped its approach and he held out two key cities as models of success to be replicated across Iraq.

“Reconstruction has not always gone as well as we had hoped, primarily because of the security challenges on the ground,” Bush said in a speech to foreign policy veterans. “Rebuilding a nation devastated by a dictator is a large undertaking. It’s even harder when terrorists are trying to blow up that which the Iraqis are trying to build. The terrorists and Saddamists have been able to slow progress, but they haven’t been able to stop it.”

The address, the second of four in the days leading up to the Iraqi parliamentary elections Dec. 15, continued an effort to reach out to an increasingly disillusioned public with a more detailed and less triumphal portrait of the advances and setbacks on the ground. While still projecting confidence about the prospects for victory in Iraq, the speech included striking concessions for a president who has repeatedly avoided admitting mistakes out of the conviction that it signals weakness.

“That kind of direct leveling with the country will buy him and the administration some time and space,” said Richard Haass, a former Bush State Department official who has been critical of the administration’s foreign policy. “It’s realistic. It’s not overreaching. This kind of realism will stand him in good stead because it won’t create unrealistic expectations.”

Some leading Democrats, though, found it too little, too late. “His comments this morning were more of the same vague generalities that he has invoked in the past, buttressed by positive anecdotes,” said House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Md. “However, anecdotes do not constitute a plan. Nor do they convey the real-world challenges on the ground.”

Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., a hawk who created a stir by calling for U.S. troops to be withdrawn as soon as practical, said the Bush team has never owned up to the reality of the quagmire. “They kept being unrealistic, illusionary about what was going on in Iraq,” he told a news conference. Despite U.S. efforts, “we lost the hearts and minds of the people.”

Bush said the administration has “changed and improved” its approach and held out the cities of Najaf and Mosul as models, the first a holy city for Shiites and the second home to a mix of Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds. He said Americans have rebuilt schools, hospitals and police stations, restored water, repaired roads and bridges and, in one case, reopened a soccer stadium “complete with new lights and fresh sod.”

“In places like Mosul and Najaf, residents are seeing tangible progress in their lives,” he said. “They’re gaining a personal stake in a peaceful future and their confidence in Iraq’s democracy is growing. The progress of these cities is being replicated across much of Iraq.”