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America's Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely envoy for the White House's newest initiative to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. His close connection with Vice President Vance has positioned a close associate of the Eurosceptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's latest push to settle the conflict.

Prior to his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or diplomat, and his early attempts to sell the deal to European policymakers were labeled turbulent.

His strong ties with Vance, who he studied and shares a close friendship, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Involvement in Ceasefire Efforts

It was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's rocky initial trip to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Currently, Ukraine is once again pushing back against pressure from the US to agree to a quick settlement that Ukrainian leaders have described as a surrender.

After a chaotic initial year in power, international decisions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a handful of Trump's top advisers, including top aide Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

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

“All criticism of the peace framework the administration is developing either misunderstands the proposal or misstates some critical reality on the ground,” Vance stated.

Early Attempts and European Responses

Vance's early efforts at hammering out a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to restore ties with Moscow, were fruitless and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were irritated by his early speeches, in which he charged them of running from their constituents, who Vance said held restrictionist and conservative views close to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the recently published peace deal mirrored his stances, and he has been one of the most assertive advocates for the deal in the government, even as the US has been criticized for accepting a peace framework that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In posts this past weekend, Vance asserted that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the war from restarting.

“A ceasefire will not be made by failed negotiators or politicians living in a dream world,” he added. “An agreement might be made by intelligent people living in the real world.”

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

Rubio's Reaction and Internal Concerns

That was a distinctly more full-throated support of the plan than that expressed by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the administration who has transitioned from a uncertain position inside the White House to more firm footing.

Rubio was a member of a US team that traveled to Geneva this weekend to confer with Ukrainian officials to help moderate the initial 28-point ceasefire proposal in order to make it more acceptable to authorities in Kyiv.

However, his first reaction to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough discussion of substantive and realistic ideas,” Rubio stated recently. “Furthermore, securing a durable peace will require both sides to consent to challenging but essential concessions. That is why we are and will continue to develop a list of possible solutions for ending this conflict drawing from feedback from both sides of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more skeptical of the plan. The Republican senator Mike Rounds stated last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called legislators to explain that the agreement was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the White House.

“Rubio made a phone call to us this afternoon and I think he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was delivered to one of our representatives,” said Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he subsequently stated. “The framework is offered as a strong framework for continuing negotiations. It is based on input from the Russian side. But, it is also based on previous and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”