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America's Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely diplomat for the Trump administration latest proposal to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. His strong connection with JD Vance has positioned a close associate of the Euroskeptic VP at the center of Donald Trump recent effort to conclude the conflict.

Before his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or diplomat, and his early efforts to sell the deal to European policymakers were described as turbulent.

His strong ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a personal bond, indicate the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in talks to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Role in Peace Efforts

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 courtesy. Now, Ukraine is again pushing back against demands from the US to agree to a swift deal that local officials have called a capitulation.

Following a tumultuous first year in office, foreign policy actions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a small group of Trump's top advisers, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

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

“All criticism of the ceasefire plan the White House is working on either misunderstands the framework or misrepresents some critical situation on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Initial Attempts and EU Responses

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, in turn, were irritated by his early speeches, in which he charged them of running from their constituents, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and conservative 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 assertive spokespeople for the agreement in the administration, even as the US has been criticized for accepting a ceasefire plan that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's extreme terms.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a ceasefire that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to both sides, and stop the war from resuming.

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

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the presentation of the peace plan in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily instructed his team with obtaining a agreement on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

Rubio's Reaction and Private Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic support of the plan than that expressed by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has transitioned from a shaky position inside the administration to more stable footing.

Rubio was part of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this weekend to confer with Ukrainian leaders to help moderate the original 28-point peace plan in order to make it more acceptable to leaders in Kyiv.

However, his first response to the agreement was tepid:

“Ending a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive discussion of substantive and realistic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, achieving a durable peace will necessitate each party to consent to challenging but necessary concessions. This is the reason we are and will continue to develop a set of potential solutions for ending this conflict based on input from both sides of this war.”

In private, he was reportedly much more doubtful of the proposal. The Republican senator Mike Rounds stated recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called legislators to explain that the agreement was just a initial proposal from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary did make a call to us this day and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was delivered to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “It is offered as a solid structure for continuing negotiations. The proposal is based on input from the Russian side. However, it is also based on earlier and current contributions from Ukraine.”