🔗 Share this article

The US Army Secretary, Daniel Driscoll, emerged as an unlikely diplomat for the White House's latest proposal to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with Vice President Vance has placed a close associate of the Euroskeptic VP at the center of Donald Trump recent effort to settle the war.

Prior to his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or statesman, and his early attempts to sell the deal to European policymakers were described as turbulent.

Driscoll's close ties with Vance, who he studied and shares a personal bond, indicate the resurgence of the non-interventionist vice-president in negotiations to end the Ukraine war.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Efforts

This was Vance who stepped in during Volodymyr Zelenskyy disastrous initial trip to the White House in March and demanded he show Trump more respect. Now, Ukraine is again resisting pressure from the US to accept a quick deal that Ukrainian leaders have described as a surrender.

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

Vance has been a vocal supporter of the latest plan, which was crafted by Witkoff and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, alongside the Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

“Every objection of the ceasefire plan the White House is working on either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some key reality on the ground,” Vance stated.

Initial Attempts and EU Reactions

Vance's early efforts at negotiating a peace deal with Russia, while also seeking to renew ties with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian counterparts. European officials, meanwhile, were angered by his early remarks, in which he charged them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance said held anti-immigration and conservative views similar to those of Trump's own supporters.

However, the recently published peace deal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most forceful spokespeople for the agreement in the government, even as the US has been under fire for endorsing a ceasefire plan that largely echoes Vladimir Putin's maximalist demands.

In posts this weekend, Vance asserted that a peace deal would have to produce a ceasefire that respected Ukrainian independence, be acceptable to both sides, and prevent the conflict from restarting.

“A ceasefire will not be made by unsuccessful diplomats or politicians residing in a dream world,” he continued. “It might be made by smart people operating in the actual situation.”

It was Vance who followed up on the introduction of the peace plan in a conversation with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily instructed his staff with securing a agreement on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this Thursday in the United States.

Rubio's Reaction and Internal Concerns

Vance's stance was a distinctly more enthusiastic endorsement of the plan than that expressed by the top diplomat and security advisor, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hawk in the administration who has gone from a shaky stature inside the administration to more stable footing.

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

But, his first response to the deal was tepid:

“Ending a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine demands an extensive discussion of substantive and pragmatic proposals,” Rubio stated over the weekend. “And, securing a durable peace will necessitate each party to agree to difficult but necessary concessions. This is the reason we are and will persist to develop a set of possible solutions for ending this war based on feedback from each party of this war.”

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

“Rubio did make a call to us this day and I think he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was presented to one of our officials,” stated Rounds. “It is not our suggestion, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “This ceasefire plan was authored by the US,” he subsequently stated. “The framework is offered as a strong framework for continuing negotiations. It is based on feedback from the Moscow. However, it is additionally informed by previous and current input from Ukraine.”