‘It’s not blackmail’: Former CIA director reveals how CIA ‘scares’ spies to keep working; old clip goes viral

A resurfaced interview with former CIA Director John Brennan has gone viral after he described how CIA instructors used financial leverage to pressure foreign agents into continued espionage. Brennan recalled being told during training that reminding agents of money they had accepted from the agency, often at the point of recruitment, could be used to “scare” them into continuing their work. Instructors defended the tactic as essential to national security rather than a form of blackmail.

CIA pressure tactics revisited amid renewed scrutiny

The viral clip features Brennan recounting how he questioned the ethics of such methods, only to be told that “it’s not blackmail” because the tactics served the security interests of the United States. He explained that agents often sign documents acknowledging CIA payments, and instructors said this acknowledgement could later be used to keep them cooperating if they hesitated or attempted to leave.






The approach Brennan described resembles methods discussed in declassified CIA training materials, such as the 1983 Human Resource Exploitation Training Manual, which outlines how financial and other dependencies can influence agent compliance without overt coercion. This serves as a contextual comparison, not a documented link between Brennan’s specific training scenario and that manual. The manual is no longer in use but remains central to debates about intelligence-agency conduct and the ethical boundaries of recruitment and control.

Social media reactions

• “Couple of agents who couldn’t be blackmailed are spilling the beans on Brennan.”
• “Epstein and Brennan – bread and butter.”
• “This guy and all like him belong in prison.”
• “I don’t understand this story, because blackmailing people seems like his favorite thing to do based on his actions.”
• “The semantic restructuring of ‘blackmail’ into ‘national security’ is a clear example of linguistic compartmentalization used to justify non-ethical control mechanisms.”
• “If you quit spying for them, then they use the evidence that you spied for them to put you in prison.”
• “Anybody ever watch American Made? Seems to confirm these sorts of tactics. And they hung Barry Seals out to dry.”
• “CIA blackmail? John Brennan says it’s ‘national security,’ not blackmail.”
• “Shouldn’t the CIA be abolished after the abhorrences and illegal activities it has done?”
• “That dude is the best blackmailer of all, right up there with Epstein… no doubt!”