"There is no ethics training at the CIA. Nothing. The problem with that (besides the obvious) is what a CIA psychiatrist once told me; he said the CIA actively seeks to hire people who have sociopathic tendencies. Not sociopaths, but people with sociopathic tendencies. Sociopaths have no conscience; and with no conscience you can easily pass a polygraph exam because you don’t react to anything. But sociopaths are impossible to control. People who have sociopathic tendencies do have a conscience, but they’re willing to operate in moral, legal, and ethical grey areas. The problem is, there’s no real way to weed out the sociopaths. And if you can’t weed out the sociopaths, you can’t weed out the psychopaths. And the psychopaths, because they’re psychopaths, rise to the leadership positions.

So, let’s say that you are a CIA case officer and you’re working overseas. And it can be anywhere. Let’s say the Middle East. You’re in Egypt. You’re in a hotel room and you have recruited a member of a bonafide terrorist group, Al-Quaeda, Hezbollah, ISIS, whatever it is. And this guy has been fantastic. Everything that he’s told you has been true. And you’ve used his information to actually disrupt future terrorist attacks. So, he’s been vetted and he’s really great. So, you’re in this hotel room and you’re meeting with him. And at the start of the meeting he says, ‘Listen, before we meet, I wanna tell you, I’ve given you everything, I’ve told you everything that’s been true, you’ve saved American lives, now you’re gonna do something for me. You’re gonna go out and you’re gonna get me a prostitute right now or I’m never cooperating with you again…’ The answer is, ‘Sure.’ I mean, you know, he’s a scumbag of course, but your job is to deal with scumbags, and you would be expected to go out and get him the prostitute. What if he asks for a child prostitute? Absolutely not, under any circumstances. But that’s not the CIA talking. That’s John Kiriakou talking. Because there’s no rule. Your job as a CIA case officer is to break the laws of the country you’re serving; that’s your job. Your job is to commit espionage, which in most countries is a death penalty crime. Your job is to convince people to commit treason for you, because they like you so much, or they like the money that you’re giving them so much. So, because it’s the nature of your job to break the law, there are no rules that are written for you to carry out that job. Now the problem there is that

link