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America's Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, was an surprising diplomat for the Trump administration latest proposal to end the conflict in Ukraine. His close relationship with Vice President Vance has placed a key ally of the Eurosceptic vice-president at the center of President Trump's latest effort to settle the conflict.

Before his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or statesman, and his early efforts to promote the deal to European policymakers were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's strong relationship with Vance, who he studied and maintains a close friendship, signal the resurgence of the isolationist vice-president in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Role in Ceasefire Negotiations

This was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous first trip to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Now, Ukraine is again resisting pressure from the US to agree to a swift deal that Ukrainian leaders have described as a capitulation.

Following a chaotic initial year in power, foreign policy decisions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a small group of Trump's key aides, including top aide Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken advocate of the latest plan, 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 misinterprets the framework or misstates some key situation on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Initial Attempts and European Responses

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a peace deal with Russia, while also seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were fruitless and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were irritated by his initial remarks, in which he charged them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and right-leaning positions close to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the new ceasefire proposal mirrored his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been under fire for endorsing a ceasefire plan that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

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

“A ceasefire will not be made by failed diplomats or politicians residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “An agreement might be made by smart people living in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the peace plan in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his team with obtaining a signature on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Internal Concerns

That was a distinctly more full-throated support of the proposal than that given by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hardliner in the government who has transitioned from a uncertain stature inside the White House to more firm standing.

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

But, his first reaction to the deal was tepid:

“Stopping a complex and violent war such as the one in Ukraine demands an extensive exchange of serious and realistic ideas,” Rubio stated recently. “And, securing a durable peace will necessitate each party to agree to difficult but essential compromises. That is why we are and will continue to create a list of potential ideas for ending this war drawing from input from both sides of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more skeptical of the plan. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds said recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to clarify that the deal was just a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the White House.

“Rubio made a phone call to us this afternoon and I think he made it very clear to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was presented to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “The document is not our suggestion, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he later stated. “The framework is offered as a solid structure for continuing discussions. It is based on feedback from the Moscow. But, it is additionally based on earlier and ongoing input from Ukraine.”