🔗 Share this article

America's Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely envoy for the Trump administration newest proposal to end the conflict in Ukraine. His strong relationship with JD Vance has positioned a close associate of the Eurosceptic VP at the forefront of President Trump's latest effort to settle the conflict.

Prior to his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or statesman, and his early efforts to sell the agreement to officials in Europe were labeled chaotic.

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, who he studied and maintains a personal bond, signal the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in talks to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Negotiations

It was Vance who intervened during Volodymyr Zelenskyy rocky initial visit to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Currently, Ukraine is again resisting demands from the US to agree to a quick settlement that local officials have described as a surrender.

After a tumultuous first year in office, foreign policy decisions in the White House are said to be shaped by a handful of Trump's top advisers, such as top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, envoy Steve Witkoff, State Department head Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“Every criticism of the ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misinterprets the framework or misrepresents some key reality on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Early Attempts and European Reactions

Vance's early attempts at hammering out a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while simultaneously attempting to restore ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, meanwhile, were irritated by his initial remarks, in which he charged them of running from their constituents, who Vance said held anti-immigration and conservative positions close to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the recently published ceasefire proposal mirrored his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful spokespeople for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a ceasefire plan that largely echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

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

“A ceasefire won’t be made by unsuccessful negotiators or politicians residing in a dream world,” he added. “It could be made by smart people operating in the real world.”

Additionally, it was Vance who followed up on the presentation of the ceasefire proposal in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his team with securing a agreement on the ceasefire accord before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

The Secretary of State's Reaction and Internal Doubts

That was a distinctly more enthusiastic support of the proposal than that expressed by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more traditional hawk in the government who has transitioned from a shaky stature inside the administration to more stable standing.

Rubio was a member of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this past weekend to meet with Ukrainian officials to help moderate the original 28-point peace plan in order to make it more palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

But, his initial reaction to the agreement was tepid:

“Stopping a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of substantive and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, achieving a durable ceasefire will require each party to consent to difficult but essential concessions. This is the reason we are and will continue to develop a set of potential ideas for resolving this conflict based on feedback from both sides of this war.”

In private, he was reportedly much more doubtful of the proposal. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds said recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called legislators to explain that the deal was merely a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an plan pushed by the White House.

“Rubio made a call to us this afternoon and I believe he emphasized to us that we are the receivers of a proposal that was delivered to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “The document 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 strong framework for continuing negotiations. It is based on feedback from the Russian side. However, it is additionally informed by previous and current input from Ukraine.”