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The US Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely diplomat for the White House's latest initiative to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His strong connection with Vice President Vance has positioned a key ally of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's recent push to settle the war.

Prior to his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or statesman, and his initial efforts to promote the agreement to officials in Europe were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, who he attended Yale and maintains a personal bond, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist VP in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Role in Ceasefire Negotiations

This was Vance who intervened during Ukraine's president's disastrous initial visit to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is once again resisting pressure from the US to accept a swift deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

Following a tumultuous initial year in office, foreign policy actions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a small group of Trump's key aides, including top aide Susie Wiles, conservative adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“All objection of the ceasefire plan the administration is developing either misinterprets the framework or misrepresents some key reality on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Initial Efforts and European Responses

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling disappointed with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, meanwhile, were irritated by his initial remarks, in which he accused them of ignoring their voters, who Vance said held restrictionist and right-leaning positions similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

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

In social media updates this weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian independence, be acceptable to both sides, and stop the war from resuming.

“Peace will not be made by failed diplomats or officials living in a dream world,” he added. “It could be made by intelligent people living in the real world.”

It was Vance who continued on the introduction of the peace plan in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly tasked his team with securing a signature on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Private Doubts

Vance's stance was a distinctly more full-throated support of the plan than that expressed by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has transitioned from a uncertain stature inside the administration to more firm standing.

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

However, his initial response to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Ending a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, securing a durable peace will necessitate both sides to consent to challenging but necessary concessions. This is the reason we are and will continue to develop a set of potential ideas for ending this conflict drawing from feedback from both sides of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more skeptical of the proposal. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted lawmakers to explain that the agreement was merely a initial offer from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the administration.

“Rubio made a call to us this afternoon and I believe he emphasized to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was presented to one of our officials,” stated Rounds. “It is not our suggestion, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was written by the US,” he later wrote. “The framework is presented as a strong framework for continuing discussions. It is derived from feedback from the Moscow. But, it is also based on previous and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”