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America's Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an surprising envoy for the Trump administration latest initiative to end the conflict in Ukraine. His strong relationship with JD Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's latest effort to settle the war.

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

His close relationship with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and shares a close friendship, indicate the resurgence of the isolationist VP in talks to resolve the Ukraine war.

Vance's Involvement in Peace Negotiations

It was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous initial visit to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more respect. Currently, Ukraine is once again resisting demands from the US to accept a swift deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

Following a chaotic initial year in power, foreign policy actions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a small group of Trump's key advisers, such as top aide Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“All objection of the peace framework the administration is developing either misinterprets the framework or misrepresents some key situation on the ground,” the VP stated.

Early Efforts and European Reactions

Vance's early efforts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to renew ties with Moscow, were fruitless and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. Leaders in Europe, in turn, were angered by his initial speeches, in which he accused them of ignoring their voters, who Vance said held restrictionist and conservative views similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the new peace deal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive advocates for the deal in the government, even as the US has been criticized for accepting a peace framework that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

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

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

It was Vance who followed up on the introduction of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his staff with securing a agreement on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Internal Doubts

That was a notably more enthusiastic endorsement of the proposal than that expressed by the secretary of state and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a shaky position inside the administration to more stable footing.

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

But, his first reaction to the deal was tepid:

“Stopping a complicated and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough discussion of substantive and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio wrote recently. “And, securing a durable ceasefire will necessitate each party to agree to difficult but essential concessions. This is the reason we are and will continue to create a list of potential solutions for resolving this conflict based on input from each party of this conflict.”

In private, he was said to be much more doubtful of the proposal. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted lawmakers to clarify that the deal was merely a initial proposal from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the White House.

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

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he later wrote. “It is presented as a solid structure for continuing discussions. It is derived from feedback from the Moscow. But, it is also based on previous and current contributions from Ukraine.”