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America's Army Secretary, Daniel Driscoll, was an surprising envoy for the White House's latest proposal to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with Vice President Vance has positioned a key ally of the Eurosceptic vice-president at the center of Donald Trump 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 initial attempts to promote the agreement to officials in Europe were labeled turbulent.

Driscoll's strong ties with Vance, with whom he studied and maintains a personal bond, signal the resurgence of the isolationist vice-president in talks to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Role in Ceasefire Efforts

It was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous initial visit to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is again pushing back against pressure from the US to agree to a swift deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a surrender.

After a tumultuous first year in power, international decisions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a handful of Trump's top advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

Vance has been a vocal advocate of the recent proposal, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, alongside the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“Every criticism of the peace framework the White House is working on either misunderstands the framework or misstates some key reality on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Initial Efforts and European Reactions

Vance's early attempts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to renew relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he accused them of ignoring their voters, who Vance said held anti-immigration and conservative positions close to those of Trump's own constituency.

But, the new peace deal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful advocates for the agreement in the administration, even as the US has been criticized for accepting a ceasefire plan that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme terms.

In posts this weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to establish a truce that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the war from restarting.

“Peace will not be made by unsuccessful negotiators or officials residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “An agreement might be made by smart people operating in the real world.”

It was Vance who followed up on the introduction of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his team with obtaining a agreement on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Private Doubts

Vance's stance was a notably more full-throated endorsement of the plan than that given by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the administration who has transitioned from a uncertain stature inside the administration to more firm standing.

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

However, his initial response to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Ending a complex and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough exchange of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, securing a durable peace will necessitate each party to consent to challenging but essential concessions. That is why we are and will continue to create a set of potential ideas for resolving this conflict based on feedback from each party of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more skeptical of the plan. The Republican senator Mike Rounds stated recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted legislators to clarify that the deal was just a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an initiative pushed by the administration.

“The Secretary made a call to us this afternoon and I think he made it very clear to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was presented to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “It is offered as a strong framework for continuing discussions. The proposal is derived from input from the Moscow. But, it is additionally based on earlier and current input from Ukraine.”