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America's Army Secretary, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely envoy for the White House's newest proposal to end the Russian invasion in Ukraine. His strong connection with JD Vance has positioned a key ally of the Euroskeptic vice-president at the center of President Trump's recent push to conclude the conflict.

Before his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator 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 shares a personal bond, indicate the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous initial trip to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is once again resisting pressure from the US to agree to a quick settlement that Ukrainian leaders have called a surrender.

Following a tumultuous initial year in power, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be shaped by a small group of Trump's key aides, such as top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing advisor Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“All objection of the peace framework the White House is developing either misunderstands the proposal or misrepresents some key reality on the ground,” Vance wrote.

Early Efforts and European Responses

Vance's early efforts at hammering out a peace deal with Russia, while also seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were fruitless and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, in turn, were angered by his initial speeches, in which he charged them of ignoring their voters, who Vance claimed held restrictionist and right-leaning positions similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the recently published peace deal mirrored his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful 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 ceasefire agreement would have to establish a ceasefire that respected Ukrainian independence, be agreeable to each party, and stop the conflict from resuming.

“A ceasefire won’t be made by failed negotiators or officials living in a fantasy land,” he continued. “An agreement could be made by intelligent people operating in the real world.”

It was Vance who continued on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his staff with securing a signature on the ceasefire accord prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Reaction and Private Doubts

Vance's stance was a notably more full-throated support of the plan than that expressed by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hardliner in the government who has gone from a uncertain stature inside the White House to more stable footing.

Rubio was a member of a US delegation that went to Geneva this weekend to confer with Ukrainian leaders to help moderate the initial 28-point ceasefire proposal in order to make it more palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his first reaction to the deal was tepid:

“Stopping a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough discussion of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio wrote over the weekend. “And, achieving a lasting peace will necessitate both sides to agree to difficult but necessary concessions. That is why we are and will continue to create a set of possible ideas for resolving this war drawing from feedback from each party of this war.”

In private, he was reportedly 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 just a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary did make a call to us this day and I think he emphasized to us that we are the receivers 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 fall in line. “The peace proposal was written by the US,” he subsequently wrote. “The framework is presented as a solid framework for ongoing negotiations. It is based on input from the Russian side. However, it is additionally based on earlier and current input from Ukraine.”