🔗 Share this article

The US Secretary of the Army, Daniel Driscoll, was an surprising diplomat for the White House's latest proposal to end the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's close connection with Vice President Vance has positioned a close associate of the Euroskeptic VP at the forefront of Donald Trump latest push to conclude the conflict.

Before his last week's visit to Kyiv, Driscoll was not known as a mediator or diplomat, and his initial efforts to promote the deal to European policymakers were labeled chaotic.

His close ties with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a personal bond, indicate the resurgence of the isolationist vice-president in talks to resolve the Ukraine war.

Vance's Involvement in Peace Efforts

This was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's disastrous first trip to the Trump White House in March and demanded he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is again pushing back against pressure from the US to agree to a quick deal that local officials have described as a surrender.

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

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

“Every criticism of the peace framework the White House is developing either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some critical reality on the ground,” the VP stated.

Initial Efforts and European Responses

Vance's initial attempts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while also seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were fruitless and left his camp feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, in turn, were angered by his early speeches, in which he accused them of running from their constituents, who Vance claimed held anti-immigration and right-leaning views similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

But, the new peace deal closely resembled his stances, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a ceasefire plan that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist terms.

In social media updates this weekend, Vance asserted that a peace deal would have to establish a truce that respected Ukrainian independence, be acceptable to both sides, and stop the war from resuming.

“Peace won’t be made by unsuccessful diplomats or politicians living in a fantasy land,” he added. “An agreement might be made by smart people operating in the actual situation.”

Additionally, it was Vance who continued on the introduction of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had mainly instructed his staff with securing a signature on the peace deal prior to Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Response and Private Concerns

That 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 conventional hardliner in the government who has gone from a shaky position inside the White House to more firm standing.

Rubio was part of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian leaders to help refine the initial 28-point peace plan in order to make it more acceptable to leaders in Kyiv.

But, his first reaction to the agreement was tepid:

“Ending a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an thorough exchange of serious and realistic proposals,” Rubio stated over the weekend. “And, achieving a lasting peace will require each party to agree to difficult but necessary compromises. This is the reason we are and will persist to create a list of possible solutions for ending this war based on input from both sides of this conflict.”

In private, he was said to be much more skeptical of the proposal. The Republican senator Mike Rounds said last week at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to explain that the agreement was just a preliminary proposal from the Russians and not an initiative advocated by the White House.

“Rubio did make a call to us this day and I believe he emphasized to us that we are the receivers of a proposal that was presented to one of our officials,” said Rounds. “The document 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 offered as a strong framework for ongoing discussions. It is derived from feedback from the Russian side. But, it is also informed by earlier and current contributions from Ukraine.”