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The US Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, was an surprising diplomat for the Trump administration newest initiative to end the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong connection with JD Vance has positioned a key ally of the Eurosceptic vice-president at the forefront of President Trump's latest effort to conclude the war.

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

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a close friendship, signal the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous first visit to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is once again pushing back against pressure from the US to agree to a quick settlement that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

After a chaotic first year in office, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be shaped by a small group of Trump's top advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat 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, together with the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the peace framework the administration is developing either misunderstands the framework or misstates some critical situation on the ground,” the VP stated.

Initial Efforts and EU Responses

Vance's initial attempts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while also attempting to renew ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, meanwhile, were irritated by his initial speeches, in which he accused them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance said held restrictionist and conservative positions similar to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the new ceasefire proposal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful advocates for the agreement in the administration, even as the US has been under fire for accepting a ceasefire plan that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to produce a truce that respected Ukrainian independence, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the war from resuming.

“Peace will not be made by failed negotiators or politicians residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “It might be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

It was Vance who continued on the introduction of the peace plan in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his staff with obtaining a agreement on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Doubts

That was a distinctly more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that given by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the government who has gone from a shaky position inside the administration to more firm standing.

Rubio was a member of a US team 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 agreement was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complex and violent war such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough exchange of serious and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio stated recently. “Furthermore, achieving a lasting peace will necessitate each party to consent to difficult but essential concessions. That is why we are and will persist to develop a set of possible ideas for ending this conflict based on input from each party of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was reportedly much more doubtful of the plan. The Republican senator Mike Rounds stated recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called legislators to clarify that the agreement was merely a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the administration.

“The Secretary 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,” stated Rounds. “It 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 strong framework for continuing discussions. The proposal is derived from input from the Russian side. However, it is also informed by earlier and current input from Ukraine.”