{"id":314572,"date":"2025-11-26T10:12:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-26T10:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/314572\/"},"modified":"2025-11-26T10:12:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-26T10:12:09","slug":"us-army-secretary-becomes-unlikely-negotiator-on-ukraine-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/314572\/","title":{"rendered":"US Army secretary becomes unlikely negotiator on Ukraine deal"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 In a matter of days, Army Secretary Dan Driscoll vaulted from being the leader of a military bureaucracy \u2014 where he\u2019s been cutting red tape to quickly buy inexpensive drones \u2014 to a key negotiator<\/a> in the Trump administration\u2019s push to end the Russia-Ukraine war<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The boyish Iraq War veteran, former venture capitalist and friend of Vice President JD Vance went from presenting President Donald Trump\u2019s plan<\/a> to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv to sitting down with Russian officials in the United Arab Emirates on Monday and Tuesday, heading up the latest phase of talks<\/a> on a possible deal to halt the fighting.<\/p>\n

Trump appears to believe Driscoll\u2019s efforts are going well, posting on social media that \u201cmy team has made tremendous progress.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cIn the hopes of finalizing this Peace Plan,\u201d Trump wrote Tuesday, \u201cI have directed my Special Envoy Steve Witkoff to meet with President Putin in Moscow and, at the same time, Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll will be meeting with the Ukrainians.\u201d <\/p>\n

It\u2019s an unlikely assignment for the Army\u2019s top civilian leader, who got the job in February<\/a> at age 38. His Senate confirmation hearing focused on how the Army could modernize its systems, improve recruiting and beef up the military industrial base, not international diplomacy. <\/p>\n

Tapping an unexpected diplomat<\/p>\n

Driscoll only learned of his new role as a negotiator about a week before he was sitting across the table from Zelenskyy<\/a>, a U.S. official said.<\/p>\n

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive plans, said Driscoll always had planned to visit Ukraine but the trip was aimed at learning more about how its military has been using drones in warfare<\/a>, not to negotiate peace.<\/p>\n

The official said after Driscoll was named as a special representative by the White House, he first traveled to Europe for briefings before heading to Ukraine.<\/p>\n

There, Driscoll clasped hands with Zelenskyy and expressed admiration for Ukrainian soldiers, saying that even the most combat-hardened American troops \u201cnever had to defend their homeland.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we the Army look and see how well you guys have done, it\u2019s remarkable,\u201d Driscoll told Zelenskyy last week. The Ukrainian leader said he spoke for almost an hour Friday with Vance and Driscoll about the proposal.<\/p>\n

Driscoll\u2019s performance in Ukraine seems to have paid off, because from there, he joined Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Witkoff and other top negotiators in Geneva to discuss changes to the plan with the Ukrainians<\/a> before traveling to Abu Dhabi to negotiate with the Russians. The negotiations with Moscow were only a possibility just a week prior, the official said.<\/p>\n

The Trump administration shakes things up<\/p>\n

Some experts say his role in the negotiations is an out-of-the-box move by the Trump administration<\/a> that may or may not pay off. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think what is helpful from this administration is its willingness to throw out ideas and try things,\u201d said Max Bergmann, director of the Europe, Russia and Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. But he added, \u201cI had not heard of Dan Driscoll, to be frank, in Ukraine-Russia conversations at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Driscoll\u2019s value is his connection to the vice president, Bergmann said. Driscoll has known Vance since law school at Yale University and previously served as Vance\u2019s adviser, giving the Army secretary a direct line to the Trump administration \u2014 and more leverage \u2014 during negotiations<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere is something to be said about having someone who is probably texting with the vice president and therefore has that political juice,\u201d said Bergmann, who served in State Department positions during President Barack Obama\u2019s administration.<\/p>\n

But Bergmann said there\u2019s also merit to having expertise, particularly on an issue as fraught as Russia\u2019s war with Ukraine: \u201cThe details really matter here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Daniel Fried, an Atlantic Council fellow who is a former U.S. ambassador to Poland, said Driscoll can overcome a lack of expertise if he has someone advising him. Plus, the fact that Driscoll is trusted by the administration is a notable asset. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t want to have someone who reaches a handshake deal with the Ukrainians or the Russians and doesn\u2019t have the confidence of the upper reaches of the Trump administration,\u201d Fried said. <\/p>\n

Driscoll\u2019s aspirations as a politician <\/p>\n

Driscoll\u2019s resume did not suggest he would be a top American negotiator trying to end the most protracted war in Europe since 1945, though he had aspirations to be a politician. <\/p>\n

Driscoll told senators during his confirmation hearing that he \u201cjoined the Army as a middle-class public school kid from the mountains of North Carolina,\u201d noting that his dad was an Army infantryman in Vietnam and his grandfather was an Army decoder in World War II.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost important, I intend to be the soldiers\u2019 secretary of the Army, not of the generals or of the bureaucracy,\u201d he said in his opening statement. \u201cIt is the American soldier to whom our national defense and prosperity are entrusted.\u201d <\/p>\n

He went to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, enrolling in its business school and graduating in three years, according to a profile on the school\u2019s website.<\/p>\n

Driscoll served in the Army as an armor officer for more than three years and earned the rank of first lieutenant. He deployed to Iraq from October 2009 to July 2010.<\/p>\n

After law school, Driscoll worked for venture capital firms. He ran unsuccessfully in the Republican primary for a North Carolina congressional seat in 2020, getting about 8% of the vote in a crowded field of candidates.<\/p>\n

Driscoll has some experience negotiating as Army secretary, involving the Army\u2019s need to continue using the only large-scale live-fire training range for ground forces in Hawaii so it can quickly send troops to Asia and the Pacific.<\/p>\n

A May public hearing on whether to extend the lease generated hours of testimony<\/a> against allowing the Army to stay. Many Native Hawaiians and environmental activists upset with the U.S. military\u2019s history of damaging lands with target practice<\/a> and fuel leaks<\/a> said they wanted the land returned to the state. <\/p>\n

Driscoll visited Hawaii in July to discuss the matter with Democratic Hawaii Gov. Josh Green, who said he spent significant time speaking to Driscoll and his team.<\/p>\n

\u201cDiscussions are cordial and are still in the early stages,\u201d Green\u2019s office said this week. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 In a matter of days, Army Secretary Dan Driscoll vaulted from being the leader of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":304077,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,8833,38431,161865,12,793,6009,73407,7931,643,161866,3,111,1206,6509,963,14741,1208,40479,21,792,19,22,20,25,24,6508,40477,964,800,965],"class_list":["post-314572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-barack-obama","tag-dan-driscoll","tag-daniel-fried","tag-donald-trump","tag-general-news","tag-jd-vance","tag-josh-green","tag-kyiv","tag-marco-rubio","tag-max-bergmann","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-russia","tag-russia-government","tag-russia-ukraine-war","tag-u-s-army","tag-ukraine","tag-ukraine-government","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-government","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa","tag-vladimir-putin","tag-volodymyr-zelenskyy","tag-war-and-unrest","tag-washington-news","tag-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=314572"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314572\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/304077"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=314572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=314572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=314572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}