Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll,a J.D. Vance Ally, Emerges as Central Player in Ukraine Peace Talks
WASHINGTON – Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll is increasingly becoming a key figure in the Trump governanceS efforts to negotiate a peace deal in Ukraine, according to sources and recent public statements. Driscoll’s rise in influence coincides with the anticipated departure of Trump’s special envoy to Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, in January, and is bolstered by his close relationship with Senator J.D. Vance, a vocal supporter of the administration’s approach.
Driscoll, who previously expressed support for deploying National Guard troops to Washington D.C.,telling Fox News in August that soldiers were “thrilled to be on this mission,” has also focused on modernizing the Army.He has advocated for a critically important investment in drone technology, calling for the U.S. to purchase one million drones over the next two to three years, praising them as “cheap, yet cutting-edge warfighting tools that will ‘absolutely dominate warfare in the twenty-first century.'” He emphasized the changing nature of warfare, stating in a recent interview with the Wall Street Journal this month, “Anybody paying attention to Ukraine knows that warfare has changed…Every single city is exposed, every single country is exposed, and one of the best ways to take down a drone threat is with another drone.”
Kellogg, viewed as sympathetic to Ukraine by European and Ukrainian media outlets-including a meeting with President Zelensky ahead of a Trump summit, as reported by the kyiv Autonomous-reportedly faced limited involvement in peace negotiations in the months following his appointment, according to Reuters.
Driscoll’s growing prominence within Trump’s circle is further cemented by his friendship with Vance, a veteran and Yale Law School classmate who strongly supports Trump’s Ukraine policy. Vance recently defended the administration’s peace plan, publicly criticizing Senator Mitch McConnell on X (formerly Twitter) Monday, writing, “This is a ridiculous attack on the president’s team, which has worked tirelessly to clean up the mess in Ukraine that Mitch-always eager to write blank checks to Biden’s foreign policy-left us.” In a separate post over the weekend, Vance asserted, “Every criticism of the peace framework the administration is working on either misunderstands the framework or misstates some critical reality on the ground.”
