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

Before his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or diplomat, and his initial efforts to promote the agreement to officials in Europe were described as turbulent.

His close ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and shares a personal bond, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

Vance's Role in Peace Efforts

This was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial trip 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 swift deal that local officials have called a capitulation.

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

Vance has been a vocal supporter of the recent plan, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, alongside the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

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

Initial Attempts and EU Reactions

Vance's early attempts 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 interlocutors. European officials, in turn, were irritated by his initial remarks, in which he charged them of running from their voters, who Vance claimed held restrictionist and conservative views close to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the recently published peace deal closely resembled 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 ceasefire plan that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a truce that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be agreeable to both sides, and stop the war from restarting.

“A ceasefire will not be made by unsuccessful negotiators or officials residing in a dream world,” he added. “An agreement might be made by intelligent people living in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who continued on the introduction of the peace plan in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his staff with obtaining a agreement on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Private Doubts

Vance's stance was a distinctly more full-throated endorsement of the plan than that given by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hardliner in the government who has transitioned from a uncertain stature inside the administration to more stable standing.

Rubio was a member of a US team that traveled to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian leaders to help moderate the initial 28-point peace plan in order to make it more acceptable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his initial reaction to the agreement was tepid:

“Stopping a complicated and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough discussion of serious and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “And, securing a durable peace will necessitate each party to consent to difficult but necessary concessions. This is the reason we are and will continue to develop a list of potential ideas for ending this war based on input from both sides of this war.”

In private, he was said to be much more skeptical of the proposal. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds stated recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to explain that the agreement was just a initial offer from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary made a 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 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 authored by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “It is offered as a strong framework for ongoing negotiations. The proposal is derived from feedback from the Russian side. However, it is additionally based on previous and ongoing input from Ukraine.”