WASHINGTON, Oct. 20 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President George W. Bush on Friday defended the questioning techniques used by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) on terror suspects, saying the techniques were necessary to get "precise intelligence, good information."

    "If you're at war, you need to make sure that you get as much information as possible in order to protect you," Bush said at a National Republican Senatorial Committee reception.

    He said the United States was at war, and the war "requires precise intelligence, good information."

    Bush signed a bill on Tuesday that authorizes the CIA to continue its practice of questioning terrorism suspects and the prosecution of "captured terrorists" for war crimes. The bill, he said at the signing ceremony, would allow the CIA to continue its program for questioning key terrorist leaders and operatives.

    The spy agency's secret detention facilities overseas, when revealed last year, caused a political uproar in Washington and attracted criticism worldwide. The CIA reportedly used very harsh questioning techniques on the some dozen prisoners it had held.

    "I set up a program that gave our CIA professionals the opportunity to question people like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed," the person believed to be the mastermind behind the Sept. 11 attacks, Bush said on Friday.

    Acknowledging that 70 percent of Democrats voted against giving CIA agents "the tools necessary to question people so we can prevent attacks," Bush termed them "patriotic" but wrong."

    With the midterm elections just two weeks away, Bush used the speech to highlight the administration's achievements in the counterterrorism war, in an effort to shore up support for Republican candidates, who were likely to lose control of one or two chambers of Congress.