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The US Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, emerged as an surprising envoy for the Trump administration latest proposal to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's close connection with Vice President Vance has positioned a key ally of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's recent effort to settle the war.

Before his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or statesman, and his initial attempts to promote the agreement to officials in Europe were described as chaotic.

His strong relationship with Vance, with whom he studied and maintains a close friendship, indicate the resurgence of the non-interventionist VP in talks to end the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Involvement in Ceasefire Efforts

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

After a tumultuous first year in power, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be shaped by a small group of Trump's key advisers, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative 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 son-in-law Jared Kushner, alongside the Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev.

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

Initial Efforts and European Responses

Vance's initial efforts at hammering out a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling disappointed with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, in turn, were irritated by his early remarks, in which he accused them of ignoring their voters, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and conservative views close to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the new peace deal closely resembled his stances, and he has been one of the most forceful spokespeople for the deal in the government, even as the US has been under fire for accepting a peace framework that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's extreme terms.

In social media updates this weekend, Vance asserted that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a truce that respected Ukrainian sovereignty, be agreeable to each party, and prevent the war from restarting.

“Peace will not be made by failed diplomats or politicians living in a dream world,” he added. “It might be made by intelligent people operating in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who continued on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his team with obtaining a agreement on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Internal Concerns

That was a notably more full-throated endorsement of the proposal than that given by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the government who has gone from a shaky stature inside the administration to more stable footing.

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

However, his first reaction to the deal was tepid:

“Ending a complex and violent conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of serious and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio stated recently. “Furthermore, securing a durable ceasefire will necessitate each party to agree to challenging but essential concessions. That is why we are and will persist to create a set of potential ideas for ending this war based on input from each party of this war.”

In private, he was reportedly much more skeptical of the plan. 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 just a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an initiative pushed by the White House.

“Rubio made a phone call to us this afternoon and I think he emphasized to us that we are the recipients of a offer that was presented to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “The document is not our recommendation, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio moved quickly to fall in line. “This ceasefire plan was written by the US,” he subsequently stated. “The framework is presented as a strong structure for continuing discussions. The proposal is based on input from the Moscow. But, it is additionally based on earlier and ongoing contributions from Ukraine.”