The CIA, reacting to the release of the Senate’s report on the agency’s extreme interrogations, acknowledged making mistakes but disputed findings that the program did nothing to help thwart terrorist attacks and save American lives.
“We acknowledge that the detention and interrogation program had shortcomings and that the agency made mistakes,” CIA Director John Brennan said.
The most serious problems, he said, occurred early on and “stemmed from the fact that the agency was unprepared and lacked core competencies to carry out an unprecedented worldwide program of detaining and interrogating suspected al Qaeda and affiliated terrorists.”
In carrying out the program, Brennan said, agency officials did not always live up to the “high standards that we set for ourselves and that the American people expect of us.”
In the years since, the agency has learned from its mistakes and has implemented “various remedial measures” to address the problems, he said.
Brennan also unequivocally defended the extreme interrogation program as “helping thwart attack plans, capture terrorists and save lives.”
“The intelligence gained from the program was critical to our understanding of al Qaeda and continues to inform our counter-terrorism efforts to this day,” he said.
In addition, he disputed the Senate panel’s assertions that the CIA hid the program from Congress, the White House and the executive branch, as well as the public.
“While we made mistakes, the record does not support the study’s inference that the agency systematically and intentionally misled each of these audiences on the effectiveness of the program,” he said.
He also noted that the Senate committee did not interview CIA officers involved in the program, who would have provided context and perspective surrounding the program and how the agency operated it.
Key administration officials spoke to reporters about the Senate Intelligence Committee’s findings Tuesday and said they supported releasing the report. They have made plans to respond to any unrest around the world and violence from extremists reacting to the disclosure.
“The release of this report is an important milestone in bringing a degree of transparency to this program,” an official said. “At the same time, it’s important that we lift up how much we value the contributions and service [of members of the intelligence community] who we ask to do an extraordinarily difficult job without any praise or acknowledgement of their service.”
The officials referred all questions to the Justice Department concerning why the administration has failed to prosecute any intelligence officials whose actions violated interrogation norms.
Asked whether Brennan should remain as CIA chief even though he was at the agency when the extreme interrogation program existed, an administration official said President Obama has “complete confidence” in Brennan to continue leading the agency.
The officials also declined to comment on whether personnel involved in the program and responsible for some of the “mistakes” still work for the CIA.
“We don’t engage in those kinds of case-by-case personnel questions,” one official said.
