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America's Army Secretary, Daniel Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely envoy for the White House's latest proposal to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His strong relationship with JD Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the center of Donald Trump recent push to settle the conflict.

Before his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a mediator or diplomat, and his initial attempts to promote the deal to European policymakers were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's strong relationship with Vance, who he attended Yale and shares a personal bond, signal the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Involvement in Ceasefire Efforts

It was Vance who intervened during Ukraine's president's rocky first trip to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is once again resisting demands from the US to agree to a quick deal that Ukrainian leaders have described as a surrender.

Following a tumultuous first year in office, foreign policy actions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a handful of Trump's key aides, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative 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 son-in-law Jared Kushner, alongside the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“All criticism of the peace framework the administration is developing either misunderstands the proposal or misstates some key reality on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Initial Attempts and European Responses

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to restore ties with Moscow, were fruitless and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, in turn, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he charged them of running from their constituents, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and right-leaning views similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the recently published peace deal mirrored his stances, and he has been one of the most forceful advocates for the deal in the administration, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a ceasefire plan that mostly resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a ceasefire that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be agreeable to both sides, and prevent the conflict from restarting.

“A ceasefire will not be made by unsuccessful negotiators or officials residing in a dream world,” he continued. “An agreement 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 tasked his staff with securing a signature on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Internal Doubts

That was a distinctly more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that expressed by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a uncertain position inside the administration to more firm standing.

Rubio was a member of a US team that traveled to Geneva this weekend to confer with Ukrainian officials to help moderate the initial 28-point peace plan in order to make it more acceptable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his first response to the deal was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complicated and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive discussion of serious and realistic ideas,” Rubio wrote recently. “And, securing a durable ceasefire will necessitate each party to consent to difficult but essential compromises. This is the reason we are and will persist to develop a list of potential ideas for resolving this war drawing from 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 legislators to clarify that the agreement was just a initial proposal from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the White House.

“Rubio made a phone 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 delivered to one of our officials,” said Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he later stated. “The framework is presented as a strong structure for ongoing negotiations. It is derived from feedback from the Russian side. But, it is also based on previous and current contributions from Ukraine.”