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The US Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, was an surprising envoy for the White House's latest initiative to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with JD Vance has positioned a key ally of the Eurosceptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's recent push to conclude the conflict.

Prior to his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a mediator or statesman, and his early efforts to promote the deal to European policymakers were described as turbulent.

Driscoll's strong ties with Vance, who he studied and shares a close friendship, indicate the resurgence of the isolationist VP in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Role in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial trip to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Now, Ukraine is again resisting pressure from the US to accept a swift settlement that local officials have described as a capitulation.

After a tumultuous first year in power, international decisions in the White House are said to be influenced by a handful of Trump's top aides, such as top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing advisor Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head 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 Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“Every criticism of the ceasefire plan the administration is working on either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some key situation on the ground,” Vance stated.

Initial Attempts and European Responses

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while also attempting to restore relations 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 views similar to those of Trump's own constituency.

But, the new ceasefire proposal closely resembled his positions, 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 peace framework that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In social media updates this past weekend, Vance asserted that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to both sides, and stop the war from restarting.

“Peace will not be made by failed negotiators or politicians living in a fantasy land,” he continued. “It might be made by smart people living in the real world.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the presentation of the peace plan in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily instructed his team with obtaining a agreement on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Private Doubts

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 hardliner in the government who has gone from a shaky position inside the White House to more stable standing.

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

But, his initial reaction to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complicated and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough exchange of substantive and realistic ideas,” Rubio wrote recently. “And, achieving a durable peace will necessitate each party to agree to difficult but essential concessions. This is the reason we are and will persist to create a list of potential ideas for resolving this conflict drawing from input from each party of this conflict.”

In private, he was reportedly 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 agreement was merely a initial proposal from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the administration.

“Rubio did make a phone call to us this day and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was delivered to one of our officials,” said Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to fall in line. “This ceasefire plan was written by the US,” he later wrote. “It is presented as a strong structure for continuing negotiations. The proposal is based on feedback from the Moscow. However, it is also informed by earlier and ongoing input from Ukraine.”