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The US Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, emerged as an surprising envoy for the Trump administration newest proposal to end the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with JD Vance has placed a key ally of the Eurosceptic VP at the center of Donald Trump latest effort to settle the conflict.

Prior to his recent visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a mediator or diplomat, and his initial efforts to promote the agreement to European policymakers were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's strong relationship with Vance, who he attended Yale and maintains a personal bond, indicate the resurgence of the isolationist VP in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial visit to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is again resisting pressure from the US to accept a swift deal that local officials have called a capitulation.

After a tumultuous initial year in office, foreign policy actions in the White House are said to be shaped by a handful of Trump's key advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“All objection of the ceasefire plan the administration is developing either misunderstands the framework or misstates some critical reality on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Early Efforts and European Reactions

Vance's initial attempts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while also seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were irritated by his initial speeches, in which he charged them of running from their constituents, who Vance said held anti-immigration and conservative views close to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the recently published ceasefire proposal mirrored his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful advocates for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a peace framework that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's extreme terms.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to produce a truce that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the conflict from resuming.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by unsuccessful negotiators or politicians living in a fantasy land,” he added. “It could be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

It was Vance who continued on the presentation of the peace plan in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his staff with obtaining a signature on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Private Doubts

Vance's stance was a distinctly more enthusiastic endorsement of the plan than that given by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a shaky stature inside the White House to more firm standing.

Rubio was part of a US team that went to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian leaders to help refine the original 28-point ceasefire proposal in order to make it more acceptable to leaders in Kyiv.

However, his first response to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complicated and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of substantive and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio stated recently. “And, achieving a lasting peace will necessitate each party to consent to difficult but essential concessions. That is why we are and will persist to develop a set of potential solutions for resolving this war based on input from both sides of this conflict.”

Behind closed doors, he was reportedly much more doubtful of the plan. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds stated recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to explain that the agreement was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the administration.

“Rubio made a phone 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,” said Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to fall in line. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he subsequently stated. “It is presented as a strong structure for ongoing discussions. It is derived from feedback from the Russian side. However, it is additionally based on previous and current contributions from Ukraine.”