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America's Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, was an surprising envoy for the Trump administration latest proposal to end the conflict in Ukraine. His close relationship with JD Vance has placed a close associate of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the forefront of President Trump's recent push to settle the conflict.

Prior to his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or statesman, and his early efforts to sell the agreement to European policymakers were labeled turbulent.

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, who he attended Yale and maintains a close friendship, signal the resurgence of the isolationist VP in talks to resolve the Ukraine war.

Vance's Role in Peace Efforts

It was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial trip to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is once again pushing back against pressure from the US to accept a quick deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

After a chaotic initial year in power, international decisions in the White House are said to be influenced by a handful of Trump's top aides, such as top aide Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“All criticism of the peace framework the White House is working on either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some key reality on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Early Attempts and EU Reactions

Vance's early efforts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to restore ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, meanwhile, were angered by his early speeches, in which he charged them of running from their voters, who Vance said held anti-immigration and right-leaning positions close to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the new ceasefire proposal mirrored his stances, and he has been one of the most forceful advocates for the deal in the administration, even as the US has been under fire for endorsing a ceasefire plan that mostly resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In social media updates this weekend, Vance asserted that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a truce that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to both sides, and stop the conflict from resuming.

“A ceasefire will not be made by unsuccessful diplomats or politicians residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “It could be made by smart people living in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who followed up on the introduction of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his team with securing a agreement on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Private Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that given by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the administration who has transitioned from a shaky position inside the administration to more stable standing.

Rubio was a member of a US team that went to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian leaders to help moderate the original 28-point ceasefire proposal in order to make it more acceptable to leaders 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 thorough discussion of substantive and realistic ideas,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “Furthermore, securing a durable ceasefire will necessitate both sides to agree to difficult but necessary compromises. This is the reason we are and will persist to create a set of possible ideas for resolving this conflict based on feedback from each party of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be 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 called legislators to explain that the deal was just a initial proposal from the Russians and not an initiative pushed by the White House.

“Rubio did make a phone call to us this afternoon and I think he emphasized to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was presented to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “The document is not our suggestion, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “The framework is offered as a strong structure for ongoing negotiations. The proposal is derived from feedback from the Russian side. However, it is additionally based on earlier and current input from Ukraine.”