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The US Army Secretary, Daniel Driscoll, was an unlikely envoy for the White House's newest proposal to end the conflict in Ukraine. His close relationship with JD Vance has positioned a close associate of the Euroskeptic VP at the center of Donald Trump recent effort to conclude the conflict.

Prior to his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or statesman, and his early efforts to sell the deal to officials in Europe were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, with whom he studied and maintains a personal bond, indicate the resurgence of the non-interventionist VP in talks to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Involvement in Peace Efforts

It was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial trip to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is again resisting demands from the US to accept a swift settlement that Ukrainian leaders have described as a capitulation.

Following a chaotic first year in office, international actions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a handful of Trump's top advisers, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a vocal supporter of the latest plan, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, alongside the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“Every criticism of the ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misunderstands the framework or misrepresents some key reality on the ground,” Vance stated.

Early Efforts and EU Reactions

Vance's early attempts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while also seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were fruitless and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were angered by his early remarks, in which he charged them of running from their constituents, who Vance said held anti-immigration and right-leaning positions close to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the recently published peace deal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive advocates for the agreement in the administration, even as the US has been under fire for accepting a ceasefire plan that largely echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme terms.

In posts this past weekend, Vance asserted that a peace deal would have to produce a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to both sides, and stop the war from resuming.

“Peace won’t be made by failed diplomats or politicians residing in a dream world,” he continued. “It could be made by intelligent people living in the real world.”

It was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly tasked his staff with obtaining a signature on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Concerns

That was a distinctly more full-throated endorsement of the plan than that given by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a uncertain stature inside the White House to more stable standing.

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

However, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Ending a complicated and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough exchange of serious and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, securing a lasting ceasefire will require each party to agree to difficult but necessary compromises. That is why we are and will persist to create a set of possible solutions for ending this war drawing from input from each party 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 contacted legislators to clarify that the agreement was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an initiative pushed by the administration.

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

Rubio acted swiftly to fall in line. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he subsequently stated. “It is offered as a strong structure for ongoing negotiations. The proposal is based on feedback from the Moscow. But, it is also informed by previous and ongoing input from Ukraine.”