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The US Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely envoy for the White House's latest initiative to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. His strong connection with Vice President Vance has placed a close associate of the Eurosceptic VP at the center of President Trump's recent push to conclude the conflict.

Prior to his recent visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or diplomat, and his initial efforts to promote the deal to officials in Europe were described as turbulent.

His strong relationship with Vance, who he studied and shares a close friendship, indicate the resurgence of the isolationist VP in talks to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Role in Peace Efforts

This was Vance who intervened 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 once again resisting pressure from the US to agree to a quick deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

After a tumultuous initial year in power, foreign policy actions in the White House are said to be influenced by a small group of Trump's top advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing advisor Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“Every criticism of the ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misinterprets the proposal or misrepresents some key reality on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Initial Attempts and European Responses

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to renew relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian interlocutors. Leaders in Europe, in turn, were irritated by his early remarks, in which he accused them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance claimed held restrictionist and right-leaning views similar to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the recently published peace deal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful spokespeople for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a ceasefire plan that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

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

“A ceasefire will not be made by unsuccessful negotiators or officials residing in a dream world,” he continued. “An agreement might be made by intelligent people living in the real world.”

Additionally, it was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his staff with obtaining a signature on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Private Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic support of the plan than that given by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the administration who has gone from a uncertain stature inside the administration to more stable standing.

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

However, his first response to the deal was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complex and violent war such as the one in Ukraine demands an extensive discussion of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, achieving a durable peace will require both sides to agree to challenging but essential compromises. That is why we are and will continue to create a set of potential solutions for ending this conflict drawing from input from both sides of this war.”

In private, he was reportedly much more doubtful of the plan. The Republican senator Mike Rounds stated last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted lawmakers to clarify that the deal was merely a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the White House.

“The Secretary did make a phone call to us this day and I think he emphasized to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was presented to one of our officials,” stated Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio moved quickly to fall in line. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he later stated. “The framework is offered as a strong framework for continuing discussions. The proposal is derived from feedback from the Moscow. But, it is also based on earlier and current input from Ukraine.”