The controversial 28-point plan dropped suddenly by the Trump administration to Ukraine as a take-it-or-leave it proposition mere days ago was mostly the result of several weeks of negotiations behind the scenes between Steve Witkoff and his Russian counterpart Kirill Dmitriev that excluded not only Ukraine and its allies but even some key US officials.
Faced with a Thanksgiving holiday deadline, European officials are racing to buy Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy more time with their own counter-proposal on how to end the war that will be presented to US officials on Sunday in Switzerland.
This reconstruction on how the ultimatum came about and who was really behind it is based on conversations with several people familiar with the deliberations who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss delicate negotiations.
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For Europeans, the alarm went off when a new player was introduced to the scene: US Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, a close friend of JD Vance going back to their days at Yale Law School. It was he who told their ambassadors and Ukraine officials in an urgent tone that US President Donald Trump had run out of patience, that Ukraine was in a bad position and that Kyiv had to agree to concede territory.
