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The US Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, was an surprising diplomat for the Trump administration latest initiative to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's close connection with JD Vance has placed a close associate of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the forefront of Donald Trump recent push to settle the conflict.

Prior to his recent visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or statesman, and his initial efforts to promote the agreement to European policymakers were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's close ties with Vance, who he attended Yale and maintains a personal bond, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine war.

The VP's Role in Peace Efforts

It was Vance who intervened during Ukraine's president's disastrous initial trip to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is once again resisting demands from the US to agree to a swift deal that local officials have described as a surrender.

After a tumultuous initial year in power, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be shaped by a handful of Trump's top aides, 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 latest plan, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, together with the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misunderstands the framework or misrepresents some key reality on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Initial Attempts and European Responses

Vance's initial attempts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling disappointed with their Russian interlocutors. Leaders in Europe, in turn, were angered by his early remarks, in which he charged them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and conservative views similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the new peace deal mirrored his positions, 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 ceasefire plan that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

In social media updates this past weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to produce a truce that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and stop the conflict from restarting.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by failed negotiators or politicians living in a dream world,” he added. “An agreement might be made by smart people operating in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his team with obtaining a signature on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Concerns

That was a distinctly more full-throated endorsement of the proposal than that expressed by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a uncertain position inside the administration to more firm standing.

Rubio was part 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 acceptable to leaders in Kyiv.

But, his first reaction to the agreement was tepid:

“Stopping a complicated and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive discussion of substantive and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, achieving a lasting peace will require each party to agree to difficult but essential concessions. This is the reason we are and will continue to create a set of possible solutions for ending this conflict drawing from 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 stated last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted legislators to explain that the agreement was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an initiative pushed by the White House.

“Rubio did make a phone call to us this afternoon and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a proposal that was presented to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “The document is not our suggestion, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to fall in line. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he later wrote. “The framework is presented as a solid framework for ongoing negotiations. The proposal is based on feedback from the Moscow. However, it is additionally based on previous and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”