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The US Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely envoy for the White House's newest proposal to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with Vice President Vance has placed a close associate of the Eurosceptic VP at the center of President Trump's recent push to settle the conflict.

Before his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or diplomat, and his early efforts to promote the agreement to officials in Europe were described as turbulent.

Driscoll's strong relationship with Vance, with whom he studied and maintains a personal bond, signal the rising influence of the isolationist VP in talks to resolve the Ukraine war.

The VP's Role in Peace Negotiations

This was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous initial visit to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is again pushing back against demands from the US to agree to a quick deal that local officials have described as a capitulation.

Following a chaotic initial year in power, international decisions in the White House are said to be shaped by a small group of Trump's top aides, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative adviser Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

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

“Every criticism of the peace framework the administration is developing either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some key reality on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Initial Efforts and EU Responses

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while also attempting to renew relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. Leaders in Europe, in turn, were irritated by his initial speeches, in which he accused them of running from their constituents, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and conservative positions close to those of Trump's own supporters.

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

In posts this weekend, Vance asserted that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a truce that honored Ukrainian independence, be agreeable to both sides, and prevent the war from resuming.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by unsuccessful diplomats or politicians residing in a dream world,” he continued. “An agreement could be made by smart people living in the real world.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the introduction of the ceasefire proposal in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his staff with securing a agreement on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Internal Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic support of the plan than that given by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the administration 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 confer with Ukrainian leaders to help refine the initial 28-point peace plan in order to make it more palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his initial reaction to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Ending a complex and violent war such as the one in Ukraine demands an extensive exchange of serious and realistic ideas,” Rubio stated over the weekend. “Furthermore, securing a durable peace will require each party to agree to difficult but necessary concessions. This is the reason we are and will persist to create a set of possible ideas for resolving this war drawing from input from each party of this war.”

In private, he was reportedly much more skeptical of the proposal. The Republican senator 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 preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary made a phone call to us this afternoon and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a proposal that was delivered to one of our officials,” stated Rounds. “It is not our suggestion, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to fall in line. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he later stated. “It is offered as a strong framework for continuing negotiations. The proposal is based on feedback from the Moscow. But, it is also informed by previous and current input from Ukraine.”