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The US Secretary of the Army, Dan Driscoll, emerged as an surprising envoy for the Trump administration newest proposal to resolve the Russian invasion in Ukraine. Driscoll's strong relationship with Vice President Vance has placed a key ally of the Eurosceptic vice-president at the forefront of Donald Trump latest push to settle the war.

Prior to his last week's trip to Kyiv, Driscoll was unrecognized as a negotiator or statesman, and his initial efforts to promote the agreement to officials in Europe were labeled chaotic.

Driscoll's close relationship with Vance, with whom he attended Yale and maintains a close friendship, indicate the rising influence of the non-interventionist VP in negotiations to resolve the Ukraine crisis.

Vance's Involvement in Ceasefire Efforts

This was Vance who stepped in during Ukraine's president's disastrous initial visit to the White House in March and insisted he show Trump more courtesy. Currently, Ukraine is once again pushing back against pressure from the US to agree to a quick settlement that Ukrainian leaders have called a surrender.

After a tumultuous initial year in power, foreign policy decisions in the White House are reportedly influenced by a small group of Trump's key advisers, including top aide Susie Wiles, rightwing adviser Stephen Miller, diplomat Steve Witkoff, secretary of state Marco Rubio, and of course Vance.

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

“Every objection of the ceasefire plan the White House is developing either misinterprets the proposal or misstates some key situation on the ground,” the VP wrote.

Initial Efforts and EU Reactions

Vance's initial attempts at negotiating a ceasefire agreement with Russia, while also seeking to restore relations with Moscow, were unsuccessful and left his team feeling frustrated with their Russian interlocutors. European officials, in turn, were irritated by his early remarks, in which he charged them of ignoring their constituents, who Vance said held restrictionist and right-leaning positions similar to those of Trump's own constituency.

However, the recently published ceasefire proposal closely resembled his positions, and he has been one of the most assertive spokespeople for the agreement in the administration, even as the US has been criticized for endorsing a peace framework that mostly echoes Vladimir Putin's extreme demands.

In posts this past weekend, Vance asserted that a ceasefire agreement would have to establish a ceasefire that honored Ukrainian sovereignty, be acceptable to each party, and stop the war from restarting.

“Peace won’t be made by unsuccessful negotiators or politicians living in a dream world,” he continued. “It could be made by smart people living in the real world.”

It was Vance who continued on the presentation of the peace plan in a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Trump had primarily instructed his staff with securing a agreement on the peace deal before Thanksgiving this week in the United States.

Rubio's Reaction and Internal Concerns

That was a notably more full-throated support of the plan than that given by the top diplomat and national security adviser, Marco Rubio, a more conventional hardliner in the administration who has transitioned from a shaky position inside the White House to more stable footing.

Rubio was part of a US delegation that traveled to Geneva this weekend to meet with Ukrainian officials to help refine the initial 28-point ceasefire proposal in order to make it more palatable to authorities in Kyiv.

However, his initial reaction to the deal was lukewarm:

“Ending a complicated and deadly conflict such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive discussion of substantive and realistic ideas,” Rubio wrote recently. “Furthermore, securing a lasting ceasefire will require each party to consent to challenging but essential concessions. That is why we are and will continue to develop a set of potential ideas for resolving this war drawing from input from both sides of this conflict.”

In private, he was reportedly much more doubtful of the plan. The GOP lawmaker Mike Rounds stated recently at the Halifax International Security Forum in Nova Scotia that Rubio had called lawmakers to clarify that the deal was merely a initial offer from the Russians and not an plan advocated by the White House.

“The Secretary made a phone call to us this day and I believe he made it very clear to us that we are the receivers of a offer that was presented to one of our representatives,” stated Rounds. “It is not our recommendation, it is not our ceasefire proposal.”

Rubio moved quickly to align himself. “The peace proposal was authored by the US,” he subsequently stated. “It is presented as a solid structure for ongoing negotiations. The proposal is derived from feedback from the Moscow. However, it is also informed by previous and current input from Ukraine.”