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America's Army Secretary, Daniel Driscoll, was an unlikely diplomat for the Trump administration latest proposal to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His strong relationship with Vice President Vance has placed a key ally of the Eurosceptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's latest effort to conclude the war.

Prior to his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or diplomat, and his early attempts to sell the agreement to European policymakers were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, who he studied and shares a personal bond, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist VP in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Efforts

This was Vance who intervened during Ukraine's president's disastrous first trip to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Now, Ukraine is once again resisting pressure from the US to accept a quick settlement that Ukrainian leaders have described as a capitulation.

After a chaotic first year in office, international decisions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a handful of Trump's top advisers, such as top aide Susie Wiles, conservative adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a vocal advocate of the latest proposal, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, alongside the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“All criticism of the peace framework the administration is working on either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some key situation on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Early Efforts and EU Responses

Vance's early efforts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while also seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were fruitless and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. Leaders in Europe, meanwhile, were irritated by his early speeches, in which he accused them of running from their constituents, who Vance claimed held restrictionist and right-leaning positions similar to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the new peace deal mirrored his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful spokespeople for the deal in the government, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a peace framework that mostly resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In posts this weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the war from restarting.

“Peace won’t be made by failed negotiators or politicians living in a fantasy land,” he continued. “An agreement could be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly tasked his staff with securing a agreement 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 full-throated support of the plan than that given by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the government who has gone from a shaky position inside the administration to more stable standing.

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

But, his initial response to the deal was lukewarm:

“Ending a complex and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive discussion of substantive and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio stated recently. “Furthermore, achieving a lasting peace will require both sides to agree to challenging but essential compromises. This is the reason we are and will persist to create a set of potential solutions for resolving this conflict drawing from feedback from each party of this conflict.”

In private, he was said to be much more doubtful of the proposal. The Republican senator Mike Rounds stated last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to explain that the deal was merely a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary made a call to us this day 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 officials,” said Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to fall in line. “This ceasefire plan was written by the US,” he later wrote. “It is offered as a strong framework for continuing negotiations. The proposal is based on feedback from the Moscow. But, it is additionally informed by previous and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”