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America's Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an surprising diplomat for the Trump administration latest proposal to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His close relationship with JD Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's latest push to conclude the conflict.

Before his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or diplomat, and his early attempts to promote the deal to officials in Europe were labeled turbulent.

His close ties with Vance, who he studied and maintains a personal bond, indicate the resurgence of the isolationist vice-president in talks to resolve the Ukraine war.

Vance's Involvement in Peace Negotiations

This was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's disastrous initial trip to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is once again pushing back against demands from the US to agree to a quick settlement that local officials have called a surrender.

After a chaotic initial year in office, foreign policy decisions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a small group of Trump's top aides, such as top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken advocate of the latest proposal, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, alongside the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the peace framework the White House is developing either misinterprets the framework or misstates some critical reality on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Initial Efforts and EU Responses

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a peace deal with Russia, while also attempting to renew ties with Moscow, were fruitless and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian interlocutors. Leaders in Europe, in turn, were angered by his early remarks, in which he accused them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance said held restrictionist and right-leaning views close to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the recently published peace deal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the deal in the government, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a ceasefire plan that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's extreme terms.

In social media updates this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be agreeable to each party, and stop the war from resuming.

“A ceasefire will not be made by failed negotiators or officials living in a dream world,” he continued. “It might be made by intelligent people living in the actual situation.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his staff with obtaining a signature on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Private Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic support of the proposal than that expressed by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the government who has gone from a shaky position inside the administration to more firm standing.

Rubio was a member of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian officials to help refine the original 28-point peace plan in order to make it more palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Ending a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough discussion of substantive and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio stated recently. “And, achieving a durable ceasefire will necessitate both sides to consent to challenging but essential concessions. This is the reason we are and will persist to develop a set of possible ideas for ending this conflict based on feedback from each party of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more doubtful of the proposal. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted legislators to clarify that the agreement was just a initial proposal from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary made a phone call to us this afternoon and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was delivered to one of our officials,” said Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was written by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “The framework is offered as a solid framework for continuing negotiations. It is derived from feedback from the Russian side. But, it is also informed by previous and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”