🔗 Share this article

The US Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, was an unlikely envoy for the Trump administration latest initiative to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His strong connection with JD Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the center of President Trump's latest effort to settle the conflict.

Before his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or diplomat, and his early attempts to sell the deal to European policymakers were labeled chaotic.

His close relationship with Vance, who he studied and shares a personal bond, indicate the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in talks to end the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Role in Peace Efforts

It was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's rocky first trip to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Currently, Ukraine is again pushing back against demands from the US to accept a swift settlement that Ukrainian leaders have described as a capitulation.

After a chaotic initial year in power, international actions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a handful of Trump's top aides, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“Every criticism of the peace framework the White House is developing either misunderstands the proposal or misstates some critical situation on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Early Attempts and EU Reactions

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were irritated by his initial remarks, in which he accused them of running from their voters, who Vance claimed held restrictionist and right-leaning views close to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the new ceasefire proposal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the deal in the government, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a peace framework that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

In social media updates this past weekend, Vance asserted that a peace deal would have to establish a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian independence, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the conflict from restarting.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by failed diplomats or officials residing in a dream world,” he continued. “An agreement might be made by intelligent people living in the real world.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his team with securing a signature on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Doubts

Vance's stance was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that given by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the government who has transitioned from a uncertain position inside the White House to more stable footing.

Rubio was a member of a US team that traveled to Geneva this weekend to confer with Ukrainian leaders to help refine the original 28-point ceasefire proposal in order to make it more palatable to leaders in Kyiv.

But, his first reaction to the agreement was tepid:

“Ending a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine demands an extensive exchange of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio stated over the weekend. “Furthermore, securing a lasting peace will require both sides to agree to difficult but necessary compromises. That is why we are and will continue to create a list of potential solutions for ending this conflict based on input from both sides of this war.”

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

“Rubio made a call to us this day and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was presented 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. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he later stated. “It is offered as a strong structure for ongoing negotiations. The proposal is derived from feedback from the Russian side. But, it is also informed by previous and ongoing input from Ukraine.”