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

Before his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or statesman, and his early efforts to promote the agreement to European policymakers were labeled turbulent.

His strong relationship with Vance, who he studied and shares a close friendship, indicate the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in talks to end the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Role in Ceasefire Efforts

This was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's disastrous initial trip to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is once again pushing back against pressure from the US to agree to a swift deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

After a tumultuous first year in office, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be influenced by a small group of Trump's top advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken 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 objection of the peace framework the White House is working on either misunderstands the framework or misstates some critical situation on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Early Attempts and EU Responses

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to renew relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, meanwhile, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he charged them of ignoring their voters, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and right-leaning views close to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, 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 demands.

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

“Peace will not be made by unsuccessful negotiators or officials residing in a dream world,” he added. “It might be made by smart people operating in the actual situation.”

Additionally, it was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his staff with securing a signature on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Concerns

Vance's stance was a distinctly more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that given by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the government who has gone from a uncertain stature inside the administration to more firm standing.

Rubio was a member of a US team that traveled to Geneva this past weekend to confer with Ukrainian officials to help refine the initial 28-point peace plan in order to make it more palatable to leaders in Kyiv.

However, his initial reaction to the agreement was tepid:

“Ending a complicated and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough exchange of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “And, achieving a lasting ceasefire will require both sides to consent to challenging but necessary compromises. This is the reason we are and will continue to develop a set of potential solutions for ending this war based on feedback from both sides of this conflict.”

In private, he was said to be much more skeptical of the proposal. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds said recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted legislators to clarify that the deal was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the administration.

“Rubio made a call to us this afternoon and I think he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was delivered to one of our representatives,” said Rounds. “It is not our suggestion, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio acted swiftly to fall in line. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he later stated. “The framework is offered as a solid framework for ongoing discussions. It is derived from feedback from the Russian side. But, it is additionally based on earlier and ongoing input from Ukraine.”