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The US Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an surprising envoy for the Trump administration latest initiative to end the conflict in Ukraine. His strong connection with Vice President Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the center of President Trump's recent effort to settle the war.

Prior to his recent visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or statesman, and his initial efforts to promote the deal to European policymakers were labeled turbulent.

His close ties with Vance, who he attended Yale and maintains a close friendship, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist VP in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Role in Peace Efforts

This was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's rocky initial visit to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is again resisting demands from the US to accept a swift deal that local officials have described as a surrender.

Following a chaotic first year in power, foreign policy actions 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, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken advocate of the latest plan, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, alongside the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the ceasefire plan the administration is developing either misunderstands the proposal or misstates some key reality on the ground,” Vance stated.

Early Attempts and EU Responses

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to renew relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. Leaders in Europe, in turn, were angered by his early remarks, in which he accused them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance said held anti-immigration and right-leaning views close to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the recently published peace deal mirrored his stances, and he has been one of the most assertive advocates for the agreement in the administration, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a peace framework that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a truce that respected Ukrainian independence, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the conflict from restarting.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by unsuccessful negotiators or politicians residing in a fantasy land,” he continued. “An agreement could be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

It was Vance who continued on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his staff with obtaining a agreement on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

Rubio's Reaction and Private Concerns

Vance's stance 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 hawk in the administration who has gone from a uncertain position inside the administration to more stable standing.

Rubio was part of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this past weekend to confer with Ukrainian leaders 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 deal was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complicated and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough discussion of substantive and realistic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “And, securing a lasting peace will require each party to agree to challenging but necessary concessions. This is the reason we are and will persist to develop a list of potential ideas for ending this war based on feedback from both sides of this conflict.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more skeptical of the proposal. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted legislators to explain that the agreement was just a initial offer from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the administration.

“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 proposal that was delivered to one of our officials,” stated 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 subsequently stated. “It is offered as a solid framework for continuing negotiations. The proposal is derived from input from the Russian side. But, it is additionally informed by previous and current input from Ukraine.”