 In 2016 "The Enemy Files", a documentary presented by a former British Secretary of State for Defence, Michael Portillo, was shown on RTÉ One and the BBC, ahead of the centenary.Portillo declared that the execution of the 16 leaders of the insurrection could be justified in its context – a military response, against the background of the appalling European war – but that the rebels had set a trap that the British fell into and that every possible response by the British would have been a mistake of some kind.He commented on the role of Patrick Pearse, the martyrdom controversy and the Proclamation's reference to "our gallant [German] allies in Europe".