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The US Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely envoy for the Trump administration newest initiative to end the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's close relationship with Vice President Vance has positioned a close associate of the Eurosceptic vice-president at the center of Donald Trump latest effort to conclude the conflict.

Before his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or diplomat, and his early efforts to promote the deal to officials in Europe were labeled turbulent.

Driscoll's close ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and shares a personal bond, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in talks to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Involvement in Peace Efforts

This was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial visit to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is once again resisting pressure from the US to agree to a swift settlement that Ukrainian leaders have described as a capitulation.

After a tumultuous initial year in power, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be influenced by a small group of Trump's top aides, such as top aide Susie Wiles, conservative adviser Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a vocal advocate 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 ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misunderstands the framework or misrepresents some key reality on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Early Attempts and European Reactions

Vance's early attempts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while also seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. Leaders in Europe, meanwhile, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he accused them of ignoring their voters, who Vance said held restrictionist and conservative positions close to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the recently published ceasefire proposal mirrored 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 accepting a peace framework that largely echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

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

“Peace won’t be made by failed negotiators or officials residing in a dream world,” he continued. “It could be made by smart people operating in the real world.”

It was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly tasked his staff with obtaining a agreement on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

Rubio's Reaction and Internal Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the plan than that expressed by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a uncertain stature inside the administration to more stable footing.

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

But, his first response to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complicated and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of substantive and realistic proposals,” Rubio stated recently. “And, achieving a lasting ceasefire will necessitate each party to consent to difficult but essential compromises. This is the reason we are and will persist to create a list of potential solutions for resolving this conflict based on feedback from each party of this conflict.”

In private, he was reportedly much more doubtful of the plan. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said recently 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 initiative advocated by the White House.

“Rubio did make a phone 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 presented to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to fall in line. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “The framework is offered as a solid structure for continuing discussions. The proposal is based on feedback from the Russian side. But, it is additionally based on earlier and current input from Ukraine.”