Mr. Brennan has adamantly denied that the C.I.A. deliberately misled the public and plans to defend the agency in a speech at its headquarters on Thursday. The White House defended him on Wednesday. “John Brennan is a decorated professional and a patriot,” said Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary. “And he is somebody that the president relies on on a daily basis to keep this country safe.”

After Tuesday’s release of the executive summary of the report, Mr. Obama repeated his belief that the techniques used after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, constituted torture and betrayed American values. But he declined to address the fundamental question raised by the report: Did they produce meaningful intelligence to stop terrorist attacks, or did the C.I.A. mislead the White House and the public about their effectiveness as the committee asserted?

That debate put Mr. Obama between two allies: the close adviser and former aide he installed as director of the C.I.A. versus Democrats on the Intelligence Committee and the liberal base that backs their findings. Instead, the president hoped to convince the public that the issue has now been confronted and resolved since he signed an order barring the controversial interrogation techniques shortly after taking office in January 2009.

“He’s between a rock and a hard place,” said Karen Greenberg, director of the Center on National Security at the Fordham University School of Law. “The intelligence agency has become the lead agency in national security, and therefore he’s beholden to it, and there’s no getting around that. It’s much bigger than before 9/11. It’s not just about Brennan.”