Updated Aug. 1, 2014 7:46 p.m. ET
President Barack Obama delivered remarks at the White House on Friday. Getty Images
WASHINGTON—President Barack Obama, reopening a debate over U.S. interrogation methods under his predecessor, said a coming declassified report would show techniques used on some terrorism suspects that "any fair-minded person would believe were torture."
Mr. Obama said the declassification of the report as soon as next week would disclose a part of America's history that was wrong and runs "contrary to our values."
"We did a whole lot of things that were right [after 9/11], but we tortured some folks," Mr. Obama said at a news conference Friday.
But Mr. Obama urged Americans who are most likely to be outraged by the findings in the report not to be "too sanctimonious in retrospect about the tough job" U.S. intelligence officials had at the time.
The president previously has referred to some of the interrogation methods as "torture," including at a landmark national-security address last year. By repeating those views on Friday, Mr. Obama set the stage for the expected release of the report, by the Senate intelligence committee, which at more than 6,300 pages is expected to present a detailed critique of the Central Intelligence Agency.
A former senior intelligence official said many CIA officers saw the criticism of the agency as revisionist history, arguing that practices employed at that time represented a national program that the agency executed on the country's behalf—not a CIA program. The CIA and Director John Brennan maintain that the program was approved by the Justice Department and wasn't torture.
The top Republican on the Senate intelligence committee said he had opposed the coming report and said it squandered committee resources.
"This study is an ideologically motivated, distorted recounting of events. I encourage everyone to read the minority views and decide for themselves," said Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R., Ga.). "These views are not an independent report—nor are they a defense of the CIA—rather, they provide the minority's viewpoint on the flawed committee study."
Human Rights advocates said the report would provide an opportunity for Congress to pass a law that would prevent methods that were used by the CIA, such as waterboarding, from being used again.
"The president is right that the American people need to understand what happened so it doesn't happen again in the future," said Raha Wala, senior counsel for defense and intelligence at Human Rights First. "It's also becoming increasingly clear that Congress will need to consider legislation."
Already, the report has been at the center of a fight between Mr. Brennan and Mr. Obama's Democratic allies in the Senate. Earlier this year, the CIA accused Senate staffers of improperly accessing CIA documents, and senators charged the CIA with illegally spying on the congressional aides.
Mr. Obama expressed "full confidence" in Mr. Brennan on Friday after an internal CIA review concluded that intelligence officers snooped on computers used by Senate staffers who were investigating the interrogation program. Several lawmakers have since called for Mr. Brennan's resignation.
Mr. Brennan apologized this past week to senators, including Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.), the intelligence committee chairman. Senators were briefed on the CIA inspector general's report, which Mr. Obama acknowledged demonstrated "some very poor judgment was shown."
Mr. Obama's remarks appeared to be an effort to align himself with Senate Democrats who wrote the coming report, while also backing Mr. Brennan, his former top counterterrorism adviser at the White House. But continuing tensions make the president's stance somewhat awkward. Mr. Brennan and committee leaders have been at odds for more than a year, since Mr. Brennan surprised the committee in June 2013 by responding to their report with a lengthy response largely rebutting it.
Despite months of meetings last year, the Senate and CIA remained at odds over what conclusions to draw from the report. The Senate concluded that the CIA's use of so-called enhanced-interrogation methods didn't produce valuable intelligence, while the CIA maintains that it did.
Mr. Obama's comments Friday are likely to draw new criticism from some Republicans, including former members and defenders of the Bush administration. But the president's remarks acknowledging the milieu in which the CIA program was launched, when officials expected another attack could come at any time, were well-received by some former CIA officials.
"Sure, he called what we did 'torture,' but that's what he's been saying going back to his first campaign, so no surprise there," said former acting general counsel John Rizzo. "But I give him tremendous credit for noting that the folks, like me, who conceived and implemented the program were under tremendous pressure to protect the homeland in a time of national crisis. He even used the word 'patriots' to describe us."
Mr. Obama has been an outspoken critic of the interrogation techniques since campaigning for the White House in 2008. His position on post-Sept. 11 U.S. counterterrorism practices won over many liberal Democrats in the president's party who opposed the measures during the Bush administration.
In 2009, Mr. Obama banned many of the interrogation techniques that were used after the Sept. 11 attacks.
Since April, the CIA and the White House have spent ample time redacting the classified report ahead of its release, an effort that is closely overseen by Mr. Obama's most senior aides. The White House returned the redacted version to the Senate committee on Friday, and Ms. Feinstein said there had been "significant" portions of the report blacked out, possibly delaying the release of the report.
"We need additional time to understand the basis for these redactions and determine their justification," Ms. Feinstein said.
Write to Carol E. Lee at carol.lee@wsj.com and Siobhan Gorman at siobhan.gorman@wsj.com
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