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The US Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, emerged as an surprising diplomat for the White House's latest proposal to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His close connection with Vice President Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of Donald Trump recent push to settle the war.

Before his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or statesman, and his initial efforts to sell the agreement to officials in Europe were labeled chaotic.

His close ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and shares a personal bond, signal the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in talks to resolve the Ukraine war.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's disastrous first visit to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Currently, Ukraine is again pushing back against pressure from the US to agree to a quick deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

Following a tumultuous initial year in power, international decisions in the White House are said to be influenced by a handful of Trump's top advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing advisor Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken advocate of the latest proposal, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, alongside the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the ceasefire plan the administration is developing either misinterprets the proposal or misrepresents some critical situation on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Initial Attempts and European Reactions

Vance's early attempts at hammering out a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to restore ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. Leaders in Europe, meanwhile, were irritated by his initial remarks, in which he accused them of running from their voters, who Vance said held anti-immigration and right-leaning views close to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the new ceasefire proposal closely resembled his stances, and he has been one of the most forceful spokespeople for the deal in the administration, even as the US has been under fire for accepting a ceasefire plan that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

In posts this weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to establish a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian independence, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the conflict from resuming.

“A ceasefire will not be made by failed negotiators or politicians living in a dream world,” he added. “An agreement could be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

It was Vance who followed up on the introduction of the ceasefire proposal in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly tasked his team with securing a agreement on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the plan than that given by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the government who has transitioned from a uncertain stature inside the White House to more stable 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 original 28-point peace plan in order to make it more palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his first reaction to the deal was tepid:

“Stopping a complicated and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine demands an extensive exchange of substantive and realistic proposals,” Rubio stated recently. “Furthermore, securing a lasting ceasefire will require each party to consent to difficult but essential concessions. That is why we are and will persist to develop a list of potential solutions for resolving this war based on input from each party of this conflict.”

Behind closed doors, he was reportedly much more doubtful of the plan. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds said recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to clarify that the deal was merely a preliminary offer 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 receivers of a proposal that was delivered to one of our representatives,” said Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio moved quickly to fall in line. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he later stated. “It is presented as a strong structure for ongoing negotiations. It is based on input from the Russian side. However, it is additionally informed by earlier and current contributions from Ukraine.”