🔗 Share this article

America's Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely diplomat for the White House's newest proposal to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's close connection with JD Vance has placed a close associate of the Eurosceptic vice-president at the center of Donald Trump latest push to conclude the conflict.

Before his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or diplomat, and his initial attempts to sell the deal to officials in Europe were labeled chaotic.

His strong relationship with Vance, with whom he studied and shares a close friendship, indicate the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in talks to resolve the Ukraine war.

Vance's Involvement in Peace Efforts

It was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial trip to the Trump White House in March and insisted he show Trump more respect. Now, Ukraine is once again resisting pressure from the US to agree to a quick deal that local officials have called a surrender.

After a chaotic initial year in power, foreign policy actions in the White House are said to be shaped by a small group of Trump's top advisers, including top aide Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

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

“All criticism of the peace framework the administration is developing either misinterprets the framework or misstates some key situation on the ground,” Vance stated.

Initial Efforts and European Reactions

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were fruitless and left his camp feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were angered by his initial remarks, in which he charged them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance said held anti-immigration and conservative views similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the new peace deal closely resembled his stances, and he has been one of the most assertive advocates for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been criticized for accepting a ceasefire plan that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

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

“Peace will not be made by unsuccessful negotiators or officials residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “An agreement might be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his staff with securing a agreement on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Concerns

Vance's stance was a notably more enthusiastic support of the proposal than that given by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hardliner in the government who has transitioned from a shaky stature inside the White House to more firm footing.

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

However, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Stopping a complicated and violent war such as the one in Ukraine demands an extensive exchange of substantive and realistic ideas,” Rubio stated over the weekend. “And, securing a lasting peace will require each party to agree to difficult but necessary concessions. That is why we are and will persist to develop a set of potential ideas for resolving this war drawing from feedback from each party of this war.”

In private, he was said to be much more doubtful of the proposal. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called legislators to explain that the deal was just a initial offer from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the administration.

“Rubio made a call to us this afternoon and I believe he emphasized to us that we are the receivers of a proposal that was delivered to one of our officials,” said Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to fall in line. “This ceasefire plan was written by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “The framework is offered as a strong structure for continuing discussions. The proposal is based on input from the Russian side. However, it is also based on earlier and current contributions from Ukraine.”