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America's Army Secretary, Daniel Driscoll, was an unlikely envoy for the White House's newest proposal to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His strong connection with JD Vance has placed a close associate of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the center of Donald Trump latest effort to settle the war.

Prior to his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or diplomat, and his initial efforts to sell the deal to officials in Europe were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, who he studied and maintains a personal bond, signal the rising influence of the isolationist vice-president in negotiations to end the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Role in Peace Negotiations

This was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous initial trip to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. 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 initial year in office, foreign policy actions in the White House are said to be influenced by a small group of Trump's key advisers, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative adviser 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 developed by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, together with the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the peace framework the administration is working on either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some key situation on the ground,” the VP stated.

Early Attempts and European Responses

Vance's initial attempts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to restore ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. Leaders in Europe, in turn, were irritated by his initial speeches, in which he charged them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance said held anti-immigration and conservative positions similar to those of Trump's own constituency.

But, the recently published peace deal closely resembled his stances, and he has been one of the most assertive advocates for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been under fire for endorsing a peace framework that largely echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In social media updates this past weekend, Vance asserted that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a truce that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be agreeable to both sides, and stop the war from resuming.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by failed negotiators or politicians living in a dream world,” he continued. “An agreement might be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

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

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Concerns

That was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that given by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the administration who has gone from a shaky stature inside the administration to more stable standing.

Rubio was part of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this weekend to confer with Ukrainian officials to help moderate the initial 28-point ceasefire proposal in order to make it more palatable to leaders in Kyiv.

But, his initial response to the deal was lukewarm:

“Ending a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough exchange of serious and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio stated recently. “And, securing a durable ceasefire will necessitate both sides to agree to difficult but necessary compromises. That is why we are and will continue to develop a list of possible ideas for resolving this conflict drawing from input from both sides of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was reportedly 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 called legislators to explain that the agreement was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the White House.

“The Secretary did make a call to us this day and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a proposal 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. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he later stated. “It is offered as a solid framework for ongoing discussions. The proposal is derived from feedback from the Moscow. However, it is additionally based on previous and current contributions from Ukraine.”