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The US Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely diplomat for the Trump administration newest initiative to end the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with Vice President Vance has positioned a close associate of the Euroskeptic VP at the center of Donald Trump latest effort to settle the war.

Prior to his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or diplomat, and his early attempts to sell the deal to European policymakers were described as chaotic.

His strong ties with Vance, who he studied and maintains a close friendship, signal the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine war.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's disastrous first visit to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is again pushing back against pressure from the US to accept a quick deal that local officials have called a capitulation.

After a chaotic first year in power, foreign policy actions in the White House are said to be shaped by a handful of Trump's top advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken supporter of the latest proposal, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, alongside the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“Every objection of the peace framework the administration is developing either misunderstands the proposal or misstates some key reality on the ground,” the VP stated.

Initial Attempts and EU Responses

Vance's early efforts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, in turn, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he accused them of running from their voters, who Vance said held restrictionist and right-leaning positions similar to those of Trump's own constituency.

But, the new ceasefire proposal mirrored his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful spokespeople for the deal in the administration, even as the US has been under fire for endorsing a peace framework that mostly resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In posts this weekend, Vance asserted that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a truce that honored Ukrainian independence, be acceptable to each party, and stop the conflict from restarting.

“Peace won’t be made by failed negotiators or officials living in a fantasy land,” he added. “It could be made by intelligent people operating in the actual situation.”

Additionally, it was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily instructed his staff with securing a signature on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Internal Concerns

That was a distinctly more full-throated support of the plan than that given by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a shaky position inside the White House to more stable footing.

Rubio was part of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian leaders to help moderate the initial 28-point peace plan in order to make it more acceptable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his first response to the deal was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complicated and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of substantive and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “Furthermore, achieving a lasting ceasefire will require each party to agree to challenging but necessary concessions. That is why we are and will continue to develop a list of possible solutions for ending this conflict based on feedback from each party of this conflict.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more skeptical of the proposal. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds said last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted legislators to clarify that the deal was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the administration.

“The Secretary did make a phone call to us this afternoon and I think he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a proposal that was delivered to one of our representatives,” said Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he later stated. “It is presented as a strong framework for continuing discussions. It is derived from feedback from the Russian side. However, it is also informed by earlier and current contributions from Ukraine.”