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America's Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, was an unlikely envoy for the White House's newest initiative to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His close relationship with JD Vance has placed a close associate of the Eurosceptic vice-president at the forefront of President Trump's recent effort to conclude the war.

Prior to his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a negotiator or statesman, and his early attempts to promote the deal to officials in Europe were described as turbulent.

His close ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and shares a close friendship, signal the rising influence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Negotiations

This was Vance who intervened during Ukraine's president's rocky initial trip to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is again pushing back against demands from the US to accept a swift settlement that Ukrainian leaders have described as a surrender.

After a chaotic initial year in office, foreign policy actions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a small group of Trump's top advisers, including chief of staff Susie Wiles, conservative advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“Every criticism of the peace framework the administration is working on either misunderstands the framework or misstates some critical reality on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Early Efforts and EU Reactions

Vance's early attempts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to renew relations with Moscow, were fruitless and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were irritated by his early speeches, in which he accused them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance claimed held restrictionist and right-leaning views similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the new 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 under fire for accepting a ceasefire plan that largely echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

In social media updates this weekend, Vance argued that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a truce that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to both sides, and prevent the conflict from resuming.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by unsuccessful negotiators or politicians living in a dream world,” he added. “It might be made by intelligent people operating in the actual situation.”

Additionally, 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 peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Response and Internal Doubts

That was a notably more full-throated endorsement of the proposal than that expressed by the secretary of state and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the government who has transitioned from a uncertain stature inside the administration 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 refine the original 28-point ceasefire proposal in order to make it more acceptable to authorities in Kyiv.

However, his initial response to the agreement was tepid:

“Stopping a complex and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of serious and realistic ideas,” Rubio stated recently. “Furthermore, securing a durable ceasefire will necessitate both sides to agree to challenging but necessary compromises. This is the reason we are and will continue to create a set of possible solutions for ending this conflict drawing from feedback from each party of this war.”

Behind closed doors, he was said to be much more doubtful of the plan. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to clarify that the agreement was merely a preliminary offer from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary made a call to us this afternoon and I think he emphasized to us that we are the recipients of a proposal that was delivered to one of our officials,” stated Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was written by the US,” he later wrote. “It is presented as a solid structure for ongoing negotiations. The proposal is based on input from the Moscow. But, it is additionally informed by previous and current contributions from Ukraine.”