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America's Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, emerged as an surprising diplomat for the Trump administration newest proposal to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. His close relationship with Vice President Vance has placed a close associate of the Eurosceptic VP at the center of Donald Trump latest push to conclude the conflict.

Prior to his recent visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or diplomat, and his early efforts to sell the deal to officials in Europe were described as turbulent.

Driscoll's strong ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a close friendship, signal the resurgence of the non-interventionist VP in talks to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Involvement in Peace Negotiations

It was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous first visit to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Now, Ukraine is again resisting demands from the US to agree to a quick settlement that Ukrainian leaders have called a surrender.

After a tumultuous initial year in office, international actions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a small group of Trump's key advisers, such as top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken supporter of the recent plan, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, together with the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“Every criticism of the ceasefire plan the administration is developing either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some critical situation on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Initial Attempts and EU Responses

Vance's initial attempts at hammering out a peace deal with Russia, while also seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. Leaders in Europe, in turn, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he charged them of running from their constituents, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and right-leaning views close to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the new ceasefire proposal closely resembled his stances, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the agreement in the administration, even as the US has been under fire for accepting a peace framework that mostly resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to establish a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be agreeable to both sides, and stop the war from restarting.

“Peace won’t be made by unsuccessful diplomats or officials residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “An agreement could be made by intelligent people living in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who followed up on the introduction of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his staff with securing a signature on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Private Doubts

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

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

However, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Ending a complicated and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of serious and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio stated recently. “And, achieving a lasting ceasefire will require both sides to agree to difficult but essential compromises. This is the reason we are and will continue to develop a list of possible solutions for ending this conflict based on feedback from both sides of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was reportedly much more skeptical of the plan. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds stated recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to explain that the deal was just a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary did make a phone call to us this afternoon and I think he emphasized to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was presented to one of our representatives,” said Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to fall in line. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he later wrote. “It is offered as a strong framework for ongoing discussions. It is based on input from the Russian side. But, it is additionally informed by earlier and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”