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The US Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely diplomat for the Trump administration latest initiative to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's close relationship with Vice President Vance has positioned a close associate of the Eurosceptic vice-president at the center of Donald Trump latest effort to conclude the conflict.

Before his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or diplomat, and his early attempts to sell the deal to European policymakers were labeled turbulent.

His strong ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a personal bond, indicate the resurgence of the non-interventionist VP in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine war.

Vance's Role in Peace Negotiations

This was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's rocky initial trip to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is again pushing back against pressure from the US to accept a swift deal that local officials have described as a capitulation.

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

Vance has been a outspoken supporter of the latest proposal, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, alongside the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“Every objection of the peace framework the administration is working on either misunderstands the framework or misrepresents some critical reality on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Initial Efforts and European Responses

Vance's initial attempts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while also attempting to restore relations with Moscow, were fruitless and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, meanwhile, were irritated by his initial speeches, in which he charged them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance said held anti-immigration and right-leaning views similar 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 spokespeople for the deal in the administration, even as the US has been criticized for accepting a ceasefire plan that mostly resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a ceasefire that respected Ukrainian independence, be agreeable to both sides, and stop the conflict from resuming.

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

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his team with obtaining a agreement on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Doubts

Vance's stance was a distinctly more full-throated support of the proposal than that given by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a shaky stature inside the White House to more firm footing.

Rubio was part of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian officials to help moderate the original 28-point ceasefire proposal in order to make it more palatable to leaders in Kyiv.

However, his initial reaction to the deal was tepid:

“Stopping a complex and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough discussion of serious and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “And, achieving a durable peace will require both sides to consent to difficult but essential concessions. This is the reason we are and will persist to create a list of possible solutions for resolving this conflict drawing from input from each party of this war.”

In private, he was reportedly much more doubtful of the proposal. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds said last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted lawmakers to explain that the deal was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary did make a call to us this afternoon and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was delivered to one of our representatives,” said Rounds. “The document is not our suggestion, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he later wrote. “It is offered as a solid framework for ongoing discussions. It is based on feedback from the Russian side. But, it is additionally informed by earlier and current contributions from Ukraine.”