🔗 Share this article

The US Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, emerged as an surprising diplomat for the Trump administration latest proposal to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's close connection with Vice President Vance has placed a close associate of the Eurosceptic VP at the center of President Trump's latest push to settle the war.

Prior to his recent visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or statesman, and his initial attempts to promote the deal to European policymakers were described as turbulent.

His strong ties with Vance, who he attended Yale and shares a close friendship, indicate the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Involvement in Peace Efforts

It was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky first trip to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is once again resisting demands from the US to agree to a swift deal that local officials have described as a capitulation.

Following a tumultuous first year in office, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be influenced by a small group of Trump's top advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative adviser Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

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

Initial Attempts and EU Responses

Vance's early efforts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while also 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 charged them of running from their voters, who Vance said held restrictionist and right-leaning positions similar to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the new ceasefire proposal mirrored his stances, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the deal in the administration, even as the US has been criticized for accepting a peace framework that largely echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In posts this weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to establish a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian independence, be agreeable to both sides, and stop the conflict from resuming.

“Peace won’t be made by unsuccessful negotiators or politicians living in a dream world,” he continued. “An agreement could be made by intelligent people operating in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his team with securing a signature on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

Rubio's Reaction and Private Concerns

Vance's stance was a notably more enthusiastic support of the proposal than that given by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the government who has transitioned from a uncertain position inside the administration to more firm footing.

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

But, his initial response to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complicated and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive discussion of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “Furthermore, achieving a durable peace will require each party to consent to challenging but necessary compromises. That is why we are and will continue to develop a set of possible solutions for resolving this conflict drawing from input from each party of this conflict.”

In private, he was said to be much more skeptical of the plan. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called legislators to explain that the deal was merely a initial proposal from the Russians and not an initiative pushed by the White House.

“Rubio did make a call to us this day and I think he emphasized to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was presented to one of our representatives,” said Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio acted swiftly to fall in line. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he later wrote. “The framework is presented as a strong framework for continuing discussions. It is based on feedback from the Russian side. But, it is also based on earlier and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”