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The US Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely diplomat for the Trump administration newest initiative to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His close relationship with JD Vance has positioned a close associate of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of Donald Trump latest effort to settle the war.

Prior to his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or diplomat, and his early efforts to promote the agreement to European policymakers were labeled chaotic.

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, with whom he studied and shares a close friendship, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist VP in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

Vance's Role in Peace Efforts

This was Vance who intervened during Ukraine's president's rocky first trip to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is again resisting demands from the US to agree to a quick settlement that Ukrainian leaders have described as a capitulation.

Following a chaotic first year in office, international decisions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a small group of Trump's key advisers, such as top aide Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a vocal advocate of the latest proposal, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, together with the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“All criticism of the peace framework the White House is developing either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some key reality on the ground,” the VP stated.

Early Efforts and EU Responses

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a peace deal with Russia, while also attempting to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, in turn, were angered by his initial speeches, in which he accused them of running from their voters, who Vance claimed held restrictionist and right-leaning positions close to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the recently published peace deal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the deal in the administration, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a peace framework that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In posts this weekend, Vance asserted that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to both sides, and prevent the war from restarting.

“Peace won’t be made by unsuccessful negotiators or officials living in a fantasy land,” he continued. “It could be made by smart people living in the real world.”

It was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly tasked his team with securing a agreement on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Internal Doubts

That was a notably more full-throated support of the plan than that expressed by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a shaky position inside the administration to more stable footing.

Rubio was part of a US delegation that went to Geneva this past weekend to meet 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 initial reaction to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Ending a complicated and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough exchange of serious and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “And, achieving a durable peace will require each party to consent to challenging but necessary concessions. This is the reason we are and will persist to develop a set of potential solutions for ending this conflict drawing from feedback from both sides of this conflict.”

In private, 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 clarify that the deal was just a initial offer from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the White House.

“Rubio did make a phone call to us this afternoon and I think he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was delivered to one of our officials,” said Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he later wrote. “The framework is offered as a strong structure for continuing discussions. The proposal is based on feedback from the Moscow. However, it is additionally based on previous and ongoing input from Ukraine.”