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America's Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, was an surprising envoy for the Trump administration newest proposal to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's close connection with Vice President Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the forefront of Donald Trump recent push to conclude the war.

Before his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a mediator or diplomat, and his early attempts to sell the agreement to officials in Europe were labeled chaotic.

Driscoll's strong ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a personal bond, indicate the rising influence of the non-interventionist VP in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Involvement in Peace Negotiations

This was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial visit to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is once again resisting demands from the US to agree to a swift deal that local officials have described as a capitulation.

Following a tumultuous first year in office, foreign policy decisions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a handful of Trump's top aides, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

Vance has been a vocal advocate of the recent plan, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, together with the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the ceasefire plan the administration is developing either misunderstands the proposal or misstates some critical situation on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Early Efforts and EU Reactions

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while also attempting to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, meanwhile, were angered by his early speeches, 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 recently published ceasefire proposal closely resembled his stances, and he has been one of the most forceful advocates for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a ceasefire plan that mostly resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In posts this weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to produce a truce that honored Ukrainian independence, be agreeable to both sides, and stop the war from resuming.

“A ceasefire will not be made by failed diplomats or officials residing in a dream world,” he continued. “An agreement might be made by intelligent people operating in the actual situation.”

Additionally, it was Vance who followed up on the introduction of the peace plan in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly tasked his team with securing a signature on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Internal Doubts

Vance's stance was a distinctly more full-throated endorsement of the proposal than that expressed by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the government who has gone from a shaky stature inside the White House to more firm footing.

Rubio was a member of a US delegation 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 palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Stopping a complicated and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough exchange of serious and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, achieving a lasting peace will require each party to agree to difficult but necessary concessions. That is why we are and will persist to develop a set of potential ideas for ending this war based on feedback from both sides of this conflict.”

In private, he was reportedly 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 lawmakers to explain that the agreement was merely a initial proposal from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the administration.

“The Secretary made a call to us this afternoon and I think he made it very clear to us that we are the recipients of a offer that was presented to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “The document is not our suggestion, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was written by the US,” he subsequently stated. “The framework is presented as a solid structure for ongoing discussions. It is derived from input from the Russian side. However, it is additionally informed by earlier and ongoing input from Ukraine.”