WASHINGTON — The White House said yesterday that it was considering a government-supported "pre-packaged" bankruptcy plan for General Motors Corporation and Chrysler instead of offering emergency loans to the auto giants. That's a move that many congressional Republicans favor but that the carmakers and some analysts say could lead to the collapse of the companies.

Bush administration officials were "very close" to a decision, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.

After Congress deadlocked on a bailout earlier this month, the White House pledged to help Detroit — in hopes of shielding the battered U.S. economy from damage that a meltdown of one or more of the Big Three could cause.

But time is growing short. GM, Chrysler and Ford have announced dramatic steps to cut costs, including idling plants and slowing production — that add to the country's immediate economic woes even though they may be necessary to the companies' ultimate survival. Chrysler said Wednesday it was closing its 30 factories in U.S. and Canada for at least a month.

In an ordinary pre-packaged Chapter 11 bankruptcy, companies meet with creditors and other stakeholders and work out how to restructure debt and make other changes so the company can survive. Only then do they head into bankruptcy court, where a judge oversees the execution of the agreed-upon plan.

How that would work on the enormous scale of the U.S. auto industry — or whether it would work at all — is not clear. It's unclear, for example, whether the government would provide the billions of dollars the companies would need to operate while in bankruptcy.

Moreover, large numbers of creditors, dealers, workers and retirees have a financial stake in the automakers' future. Getting all of these parties to sign off on a restructuring plan for GM or Chrysler might be impossible without the oversight of a bankruptcy judge, according to Craig Litherland, a bankruptcy specialist with the law firm Gilbert Oshinsky in Austin, Texas.

"I don't see how you can do that in a pre-packaged bankruptcy," Litherland said in a recent interview. "With their legacy costs, you have tens of thousands of people who would be affected. Outside of bankruptcy court, how do you negotiate with all of those people?"

He also said that "pre-packs" tend to be a better option when the company's prospects are beginning to improve and creditors have a high degree of confidence that restructuring will succeed. That's not the case with GM and Chrysler. The U.S. economy is in deep recession, auto sales in November hit their lowest monthly level since 1982, and many analysts expect sales to continue to fall next year.

Supporters say a bankruptcy could force restructuring of union contracts and other debt because a bankruptcy judge can void existing agreements.

"Absent such restructuring, we do not believe any amount of money will succeed in saving these companies," seven Republican senators wrote to President Bush this week.

If the federal government steps in with money to keep the companies operating through the bankruptcy proceedings — GM and Chrysler say they are nearly out of operating cash — taxpayers could be on the line for more than the $14 billion in short-term emergency loans GM and Chrysler sought from Congress.

Lynn LoPucki, a UCLA law professor, said government money would likely be needed because the credit crunch has made it difficult to get private loans.

GM could require more than $20 billion in financing to make it through bankruptcy, LoPucki estimated. However, with first claim on GM's more than $100 billion in assets, the government would stand a good chance of getting its money back whether the automaker survives or is liquidated, he said.

Bush said yesterday he had not decided how to help the automakers, although he has vowed not to let them fail. Many Republicans have been pressuring Bush not to extend loans from the $700 billion Wall Street rescue fund for fear it would set a precedent for helping other troubled industries beyond the financial services sector.

Bush said that he would prefer the government not get involved in helping troubled companies but expressed concern about the impact a failure in Detroit could have.

"I think, under normal circumstances, no question the bankruptcy court is the best way to sort through credit, and debt, and restructuring," Bush told an audience at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. "These aren't normal circumstances. That's the problem."