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The US Army Secretary, Daniel Driscoll, was an unlikely diplomat for the White House's latest proposal to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with JD Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's recent effort to settle the war.

Prior to his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or statesman, and his early efforts to sell the agreement to officials in Europe were described as turbulent.

His strong ties with Vance, with whom he studied and maintains a close friendship, indicate the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to end the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Role in Ceasefire Efforts

It was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous first trip to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more respect. Now, Ukraine is once again resisting demands from the US to accept a quick deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

Following a chaotic first year in office, international decisions in the White House are said to be shaped by a handful of Trump's key aides, such as top aide 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 recent plan, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, alongside the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“Every objection of the peace framework the administration is working on either misinterprets the proposal or misrepresents some key situation on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Early Attempts and European Responses

Vance's early efforts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to renew relations with Moscow, were fruitless and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, in turn, were angered by his early remarks, in which he charged them of running from their voters, who Vance claimed held restrictionist and conservative positions similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the recently published ceasefire proposal mirrored his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive advocates for the deal in the government, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a ceasefire plan that largely echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In posts this weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to establish a truce that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and stop the conflict from restarting.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by failed diplomats or politicians living in a dream world,” he added. “It could be made by smart people living in the actual situation.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the introduction of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily instructed his team with obtaining a signature on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this Thursday 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 plan 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 position inside the administration to more firm standing.

Rubio was a member of a US delegation that went to Geneva this weekend to confer with Ukrainian officials to help refine the original 28-point peace plan in order to make it more palatable 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 requires an thorough exchange of substantive and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “And, achieving a durable peace will necessitate each party to agree to difficult but necessary compromises. This is the reason we are and will persist to develop a list of potential solutions for resolving 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 Republican senator Mike Rounds stated recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted legislators to explain that the deal was merely a initial proposal from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the administration.

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

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he later stated. “It is offered as a solid structure for ongoing negotiations. The proposal is derived from input from the Moscow. However, it is additionally based on previous and current input from Ukraine.”