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America's Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, was an surprising diplomat for the Trump administration latest initiative to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's close relationship with JD Vance has positioned a close associate of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the center of President Trump's latest effort to conclude the conflict.

Before his recent trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a mediator or statesman, and his initial efforts to sell the deal to officials in Europe were labeled turbulent.

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and shares a close friendship, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist VP in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

The VP's Role in Peace Negotiations

It was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's rocky initial visit to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more respect. Currently, Ukraine is again pushing back against pressure from the US to agree to a swift deal that Ukrainian leaders have called a capitulation.

After a tumultuous first year in office, international decisions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a handful of Trump's key advisers, such as chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and finally Vance.

Vance has been a outspoken advocate of the latest plan, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's relative Jared Kushner, together with the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“All objection of the ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misunderstands the framework or misstates some critical reality on the ground,” the VP stated.

Early Efforts and EU Reactions

Vance's initial efforts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to restore ties with Moscow, were fruitless and left his camp feeling disappointed with their Russian counterparts. Leaders in Europe, in turn, were angered by his early speeches, in which he accused them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance said held restrictionist and right-leaning positions close to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the recently published ceasefire proposal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been criticized for accepting a peace framework that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In social media updates this past weekend, Vance asserted that a peace deal would have to establish a truce that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and prevent the conflict from restarting.

“A ceasefire will not be made by unsuccessful diplomats or politicians residing in a fantasy land,” he added. “It might be made by smart people operating in the real world.”

It was Vance who continued on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly tasked his team with obtaining a agreement on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

Rubio's Reaction and Private Doubts

That was a distinctly more full-throated endorsement of the proposal than that given by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has gone from a shaky stature inside the White House to more stable standing.

Rubio was part of a US team that went to Geneva this past weekend to meet with Ukrainian officials to help refine 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 lukewarm:

“Ending a complicated and violent war such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of serious and pragmatic ideas,” Rubio stated over the weekend. “And, achieving a lasting ceasefire will require each party to consent to challenging but necessary compromises. That is why we are and will persist to develop a set of possible ideas for ending this war based on feedback from both sides 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 contacted legislators to explain that the agreement was merely a initial offer from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the administration.

“The Secretary 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 delivered to one of our officials,” stated Rounds. “It is not our suggestion, it is not our peace plan.”

Rubio acted swiftly to align himself. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “It is presented as a strong structure for ongoing discussions. It is derived from input from the Russian side. However, it is additionally based on earlier and ongoing input from Ukraine.”