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The US Army Secretary, Daniel Driscoll, was an surprising envoy for the White House's newest initiative to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. His close relationship with Vice President Vance has placed a key ally of the Eurosceptic vice-president at the forefront of Donald Trump latest push to settle the conflict.

Prior to his recent visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or statesman, and his early efforts to sell the agreement to officials in Europe were labeled chaotic.

His strong relationship with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a personal bond, indicate the rising influence of the isolationist vice-president in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Role in Peace Negotiations

This was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous initial trip to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is again pushing back against pressure from the US to accept a swift settlement that local officials have described as a surrender.

Following a tumultuous first year in power, international decisions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a handful of Trump's key aides, including top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a vocal supporter of the recent plan, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, together with the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“All criticism of the peace framework the White House is developing either misunderstands the proposal or misrepresents some critical reality on the ground,” the VP stated.

Early Efforts and European Reactions

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a peace deal with Russia, while also seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were fruitless and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he accused them of running from their constituents, who Vance said held anti-immigration and conservative views similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the new ceasefire proposal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful advocates for the deal in the government, even as the US has been under fire for endorsing a ceasefire plan that largely echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In social media updates this past weekend, Vance asserted that a peace deal would have to establish a ceasefire that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the conflict from resuming.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by failed negotiators or officials residing in a fantasy land,” he continued. “It might be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

It was Vance who continued on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily instructed his staff with obtaining a agreement on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this Thursday 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 proposal than that expressed by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hardliner in the government who has transitioned from a shaky stature inside the administration to more stable footing.

Rubio was part of a US delegation that went to Geneva this weekend to confer with Ukrainian officials to help refine the original 28-point peace plan in order to make it more palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

However, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Ending a complex and violent war such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive discussion of substantive and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, achieving a durable peace will require both sides to agree to challenging but necessary concessions. That is why we are and will continue to develop a set of possible solutions for ending this conflict based on 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 said last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to explain that the deal was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the administration.

“The Secretary made a 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 presented to one of our officials,” stated Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “It is offered as a solid framework for ongoing discussions. The proposal is derived from feedback from the Russian side. But, it is also based on previous and ongoing input from Ukraine.”