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The US Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely envoy for the White House's latest initiative to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His strong connection with Vice President Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the center of Donald Trump latest effort to settle the conflict.

Before his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or statesman, and his early efforts to promote the deal to European policymakers were labeled chaotic.

Driscoll's strong ties with Vance, who he studied and maintains a personal bond, indicate the rising influence of the non-interventionist VP in talks to resolve the Ukraine war.

Vance's Involvement in Peace Efforts

It was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial visit to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Currently, Ukraine is again pushing back against demands from the US to agree to a quick deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

Following a tumultuous initial year in power, international actions in the White House are reportedly shaped by a handful of Trump's top aides, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“All criticism of the peace framework the White House is developing either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some key reality on the ground,” Vance stated.

Early Efforts and European Responses

Vance's early attempts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling disappointed with their Russian interlocutors. Leaders in Europe, meanwhile, were irritated by his initial speeches, in which he charged them of ignoring their voters, who Vance said held restrictionist and right-leaning views close to those of Trump's own supporters.

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

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a peace deal would have to establish a truce that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the war from restarting.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by failed diplomats or officials living in a dream world,” he added. “It could be made by smart people living in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who continued on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily tasked his team with securing a agreement on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Private Concerns

Vance's stance was a distinctly more enthusiastic support of the plan than that expressed by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the administration who has gone from a uncertain position inside the administration to more stable standing.

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

But, his first reaction to the agreement was tepid:

“Stopping a complex and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine demands an thorough exchange of substantive and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio stated over the weekend. “And, securing a lasting ceasefire will require both sides to consent to difficult but essential concessions. That is why we are and will persist to create a set of possible solutions for resolving this conflict based on feedback from both sides of this conflict.”

In private, he was said to be much more doubtful of the plan. The Republican senator Mike Rounds stated last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted legislators to clarify that the agreement was merely a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the White House.

“Rubio did make a call to us this day and I think he emphasized to us that we are the recipients of a offer that was presented to one of our officials,” said Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he later wrote. “It is presented as a strong framework for continuing discussions. It is derived from feedback from the Moscow. But, it is additionally based on earlier and current contributions from Ukraine.”