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The US Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely diplomat for the Trump administration newest initiative to end the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong connection with JD Vance has positioned a key ally of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the center of President Trump's recent effort to settle the war.

Before his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or statesman, and his initial attempts to sell the deal to officials in Europe were labeled chaotic.

Driscoll's strong relationship with Vance, with whom he studied and maintains a personal bond, signal the rising influence of the isolationist VP in talks to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Role in Ceasefire Negotiations

This was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial visit to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is again resisting demands from the US to accept a quick settlement that local officials have described as a surrender.

After a chaotic initial year in office, international actions in the White House are said to be influenced by a handful of Trump's top advisers, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken advocate of the latest proposal, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, together with the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

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

Early Attempts and EU Reactions

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while also seeking to renew relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. European officials, meanwhile, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he accused them of ignoring their voters, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and conservative views close to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, 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 under fire for accepting a ceasefire plan that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In social media updates this past weekend, Vance asserted that a peace deal would have to establish a ceasefire that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be agreeable to each party, and prevent the war from resuming.

“Peace won’t be made by unsuccessful negotiators or politicians residing in a fantasy land,” he continued. “An agreement might be made by smart people living in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who followed up on the introduction of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly tasked his staff with securing a agreement on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Internal Doubts

Vance's stance was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that expressed by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the government who has transitioned from a uncertain stature inside the administration to more firm standing.

Rubio was part of a US team that went to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian leaders to help refine the original 28-point peace plan in order to make it more acceptable to leaders in Kyiv.

However, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Stopping a complicated and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough exchange of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “And, achieving a lasting peace will necessitate both sides to consent to difficult but necessary concessions. That is why we are and will persist to develop a list of potential ideas for ending this conflict 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 last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called legislators to clarify that the deal was merely a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an initiative pushed by the White House.

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

Rubio moved quickly to fall in line. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he later stated. “It is offered as a strong structure for continuing discussions. It is based on input from the Moscow. But, it is also based on earlier and current contributions from Ukraine.”