🔗 Share this article

The US Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely envoy for the White House's newest proposal to end the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with Vice President Vance has placed a close associate of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's recent push to settle the war.

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 European policymakers were labeled chaotic.

His close ties with Vance, who he attended Yale and maintains a close friendship, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in talks to resolve the Ukraine war.

The VP's Involvement in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's rocky first trip to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is again resisting pressure from the US to agree to a swift settlement that local officials have described as a capitulation.

Following a chaotic initial year in power, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be shaped by a small group of Trump's key advisers, such as top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing advisor Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“Every criticism of the ceasefire plan the administration is developing either misunderstands the framework or misrepresents some critical situation on the ground,” the VP stated.

Early Efforts and European Responses

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to restore ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. Leaders in Europe, meanwhile, were irritated by his initial speeches, in which he accused them of running from their voters, who Vance said held anti-immigration and conservative positions close to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the new peace deal closely resembled his stances, and he has been one of the most forceful advocates for the deal in the government, even as the US has been criticized for accepting a peace framework that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme terms.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to establish a ceasefire that respected Ukrainian independence, be agreeable to each party, and stop the war from restarting.

“A ceasefire will not be made by failed diplomats or officials residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “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 primarily instructed his staff with obtaining a signature on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Private Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that expressed by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the administration who has transitioned from a uncertain position inside the administration to more firm standing.

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

However, his initial reaction to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complicated and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough exchange of serious and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, achieving a durable peace will necessitate each party to consent to challenging but necessary compromises. This is the reason we are and will continue to create a list of possible solutions for resolving this conflict drawing from input from both sides of this conflict.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be 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 contacted lawmakers to clarify that the deal was merely a initial proposal from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the White House.

“Rubio made a phone call to us this afternoon and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a proposal that was presented to one of our officials,” said Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he later wrote. “It is presented as a solid structure for continuing negotiations. It is derived from feedback from the Russian side. But, it is additionally based on previous and ongoing input from Ukraine.”