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America's Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely envoy for the White House's latest initiative to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong connection with JD Vance has positioned a close associate of the Eurosceptic VP at the center of President Trump's recent effort to settle the war.

Before his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or diplomat, and his early efforts to promote the agreement to officials in Europe were described as chaotic.

Driscoll's strong ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a close friendship, indicate the resurgence of the isolationist VP in talks to end the Ukraine war.

The VP's Role in Peace Negotiations

It was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky first trip to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Currently, Ukraine is once again resisting pressure from the US to accept a quick deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

Following a tumultuous initial year in power, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be shaped by a handful of Trump's top aides, including top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken supporter of the latest plan, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, together with the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“All criticism of the ceasefire plan the White House is working on either misunderstands the proposal or misrepresents some key reality on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Early Efforts and EU Reactions

Vance's early efforts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to renew relations with Moscow, were fruitless and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. Leaders in Europe, meanwhile, were irritated by his early speeches, in which he charged them of ignoring their voters, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and conservative views similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the recently published peace deal mirrored his stances, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the deal in the government, even as the US has been under fire for endorsing a ceasefire plan that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme terms.

In posts this weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to establish a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian independence, be agreeable to each party, and stop the war from resuming.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by failed negotiators or officials residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “It might be made by smart people living in the real world.”

It was Vance who followed up 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.

Rubio's Response and Internal Concerns

Vance's stance was a notably more enthusiastic support of the plan than that expressed by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has transitioned from a uncertain position inside the White House to more stable standing.

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

But, his initial response to the agreement was lukewarm:

“Ending a complicated and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine demands an extensive exchange of substantive and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, achieving a durable peace will necessitate each party to agree to challenging but essential concessions. That is why we are and will persist to create a list of potential ideas for ending this conflict based on input from both sides of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was reportedly much more skeptical of the proposal. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds stated last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to clarify that the deal was just a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the White House.

“Rubio made a phone call to us this day and I believe he emphasized to us that we are the recipients of a offer that was delivered to one of our officials,” stated Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was written by the US,” he later wrote. “It is presented as a solid structure for continuing negotiations. It is based on input from the Russian side. However, it is also based on earlier and current input from Ukraine.”