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The US Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, was an surprising diplomat for the Trump administration latest initiative to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with Vice President Vance has placed a close associate of the Eurosceptic VP at the forefront of Donald Trump latest effort to settle the conflict.

Before his recent visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or statesman, and his early efforts to sell the deal to European policymakers were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's close ties with Vance, who he studied and shares a personal bond, signal the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Role in Ceasefire Negotiations

This was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky first trip to the 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 quick deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

Following a tumultuous first year in power, foreign policy decisions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a handful of Trump's key advisers, including top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing advisor Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

Vance has been a vocal supporter of the recent proposal, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, alongside the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misunderstands the framework or misstates some critical situation on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Initial Efforts and EU Responses

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were fruitless and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were irritated by his early speeches, in which he accused them of running from their voters, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and right-leaning positions similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the recently published ceasefire proposal closely resembled his stances, and he has been one of the most assertive advocates for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been under fire for accepting a ceasefire plan that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In social media updates this weekend, Vance asserted that a peace deal would have to produce a ceasefire that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be agreeable to each party, and stop the conflict from resuming.

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

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

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Private Concerns

Vance's stance was a notably more full-throated endorsement of the proposal than that given by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the government who has transitioned from a shaky position inside the administration to more firm standing.

Rubio was a member of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this weekend to meet 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 reaction to the deal was tepid:

“Stopping a complex and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough discussion of substantive and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “And, securing a durable ceasefire will necessitate each party to consent to difficult but essential concessions. That is why we are and will persist to develop a list of potential ideas for resolving this war based on input from both sides of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more skeptical of the plan. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds stated last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted lawmakers to explain that the deal was merely a initial offer from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the White House.

“The Secretary did make a call to us this day and I think he emphasized to us that we are the receivers of a proposal that was delivered to one of our officials,” said Rounds. “The document is not our suggestion, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to fall in line. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he later stated. “The framework is presented as a solid structure for ongoing discussions. It is derived from feedback from the Moscow. But, it is additionally based on previous and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”