CIA director John Brennan defends his agency — Transcript

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1. 0:00Today, the director of the CIA made a
2. 0:03surprising admission about
3. 0:04interrogations of terrorism suspects
4. 0:07after 9/11. But John Brennan also said
5. 0:10the enhanced interrogation techniques
6. 0:12were valuable. Brennan's appearance was
7. 0:14in rebuttal to this week's damning
8. 0:16Senate investigation of the CIA. And
9. 0:19here's Bob our Boore. In an extremely
10. 0:22rare televised news conference, CIA
11. 0:24director John Brennan acknowledged some
12. 0:26interrogators used unacceptable and
13. 0:28brutal tactics in questioning al-Qaeda
14. 0:31detainees. In a limited number of cases,
15. 0:34agency officers used interrogation
16. 0:36techniques that had not been authorized,
17. 0:39were abhorrent, and rightly should be
18. 0:42repudiated by all. But Brennan stopped
19. 0:44short of using the word torture and
20. 0:46broadly defended the CIA's detention
21. 0:48program ordered by the Bush White House
22. 0:50in the tense days following 911. We
23. 0:53feared more blows from an enemy we
24. 0:55couldn't see and an evil we couldn't
25. 0:58fathom. Brennan rejected allegations by
26. 1:00Democrats on the Senate Intelligence
27. 1:02Committee that so-called enhanced
28. 1:04interrogation techniques used on dozens
29. 1:06of detainees produced no actionable
30. 1:08intelligence. Our reviews indicate that
31. 1:11the detention and interrogation program
32. 1:13produced useful intelligence that helped
33. 1:16the United States thwart attack plans,
34. 1:19capture terrorists, and save lives. But
35. 1:21as Brennan was speaking, intelligence
36. 1:23committee chairman Diane Feinstein let
37. 1:25loose with a torrent of tweets,
38. 1:27rebutting the CIA director point by
39. 1:29point. In one, she wrote, "No evidence
40. 1:32that terror attacks were stopped,
41. 1:34terrorists captured, or lives saved
42. 1:36through the use of EIT." In another, she
43. 1:39added, "Coercive interrogation
44. 1:41techniques don't work." Brennan said
45. 1:44there's no way to know whether or not
46. 1:46the techniques provided breakthrough
47. 1:48intelligence. There was useful
48. 1:50intelligence, very useful, valuable
49. 1:52intelligence that was obtained from
50. 1:54individuals who had been at some point
51. 1:57subjected to the
52. 1:58EIT. Whether that could have been
53. 2:00obtained without the use of those EITs
54. 2:03is something again that is unknowable.
55. 2:05Now, Brennan repeated his opposition to
56. 2:07the use of those harsh techniques. He
57. 2:09said now that he's working to restore
58. 2:11the faith of his workforce and his
59. 2:12foreign intelligence partners. Rocked
60. 2:14Scott by this week's Senate Reports
61. 2:16disclosures. Bob, thank you.