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America's Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely envoy for the Trump administration latest proposal to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His close connection with Vice President Vance has placed a key ally of the Euroskeptic VP at the center of Donald Trump latest push to conclude the war.

Prior to his recent visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a mediator or statesman, and his early efforts to sell the deal to European policymakers were labeled turbulent.

Driscoll's close ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a personal bond, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in talks to end the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Involvement in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's disastrous first visit to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more respect. Now, Ukraine is again pushing back against demands from the US to agree to a quick settlement that local officials have described as a capitulation.

Following a chaotic first year in power, international actions in the White House are said to be shaped by a handful of Trump's key aides, such as top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

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

“Every objection of the ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misinterprets the framework or misstates some key reality on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Initial Efforts and European Reactions

Vance's early attempts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, meanwhile, were angered by his early speeches, in which he accused them of ignoring their voters, who Vance said held restrictionist and right-leaning positions similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the new peace deal mirrored his stances, and he has been one of the most forceful spokespeople for the deal in the administration, even as the US has been under fire for accepting a ceasefire plan that largely resembles Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In posts this past weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian independence, be acceptable to both sides, and prevent the conflict from resuming.

“A ceasefire will not be made by unsuccessful diplomats or officials living in a dream world,” he continued. “It could be made by smart people operating in the actual situation.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the presentation of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily instructed his team with securing a agreement on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

Rubio's Reaction and Internal Concerns

Vance's stance was a notably more enthusiastic support of the plan than that given by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the administration who has transitioned from a shaky stature inside the administration to more firm standing.

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 ceasefire proposal in order to make it more palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

However, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Ending a complicated and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine demands an extensive discussion of substantive and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “Furthermore, securing a lasting peace will necessitate both sides to consent to challenging but essential concessions. This is the reason we are and will persist to create a list of possible ideas for ending this war based on input from each party of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was reportedly much more skeptical of the plan. The Republican senator Mike Rounds stated last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had contacted lawmakers to explain that the agreement was just a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the White House.

“The Secretary made a phone 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. “It is not our suggestion, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “The peace proposal was authored 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 informed by previous and current input from Ukraine.”