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America's Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely envoy for the Trump administration newest proposal to end the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's close relationship with JD Vance has positioned a close associate of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the center of President Trump's latest effort to conclude the conflict.

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

His close ties with Vance, who he attended Yale and maintains a close friendship, indicate the rising influence of the non-interventionist VP in talks to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Role in Peace Negotiations

This was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's disastrous initial trip to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Now, Ukraine is once again pushing back against demands from the US to accept a quick settlement that local officials have called a surrender.

Following a chaotic initial year in office, international actions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a handful of Trump's top advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken advocate of the recent plan, which was developed by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, together with the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the peace framework the White House is developing either misinterprets the proposal or misrepresents some critical reality on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Initial Efforts and EU Reactions

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. European officials, meanwhile, were irritated by his initial remarks, in which he charged them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and right-leaning views similar to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the recently published peace deal mirrored his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been under fire for endorsing a peace framework that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a truce that respected Ukrainian independence, be agreeable to each party, and stop the conflict from resuming.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by failed negotiators or politicians living in a dream world,” he added. “An agreement could be made by smart people living in the actual situation.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the introduction of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily instructed his staff with obtaining a agreement on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Private Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that expressed by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the government who has transitioned from a shaky stature inside the administration to more stable standing.

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

However, his initial response to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Stopping a complex and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough discussion of substantive and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, achieving a lasting peace will necessitate each party to consent to difficult but necessary concessions. This is the reason we are and will continue to develop a list of possible solutions for resolving this war drawing from feedback from each party of this conflict.”

Behind closed doors, he was reportedly much more skeptical of the proposal. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted lawmakers to explain that the deal was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the administration.

“Rubio did make a call to us this afternoon and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was presented to one of our representatives,” said Rounds. “It is not our suggestion, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “It is offered as a strong structure for continuing negotiations. The proposal is derived from feedback from the Moscow. However, it is additionally informed by earlier and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”