Tom Bowman

and it's likely other European allies will balk at this plan as well.

The proposal calls for auctioning off leases in the eastern Gulf and the untouched high Arctic in Alaska, as well as up and down the California coast, which hasn't seen new drilling in decades.

Oil and gas groups welcome the move as opening up investments.

Environmental groups have denounced it as high risk and low reward.

Wade Crowfoot, the California Secretary for Natural Resources, called into a press conference from the California coastline and spoke with waves crashing behind him.

Expanding offshore oil drilling is a danger.

The plan will be open for public comment for 60 days.

Camila Dominovsky, NPR News.

After the meeting with Army Secretary Dan Driscoll for an hour or so, Zelensky released a statement that was pretty conciliatory, saying they agreed to work on the plan's provisions to end the war.

Another U.S.

official, not authorized to speak publicly, tells us that Driscoll and Zelensky agreed, get this, on an aggressive timeline for signature negotiations.

So it seems this is all moving quite quickly, despite the concerns of European allies.

Driscoll and General George had already planned a trip to Ukraine to talk about drone technology and lessons learned from the Ukrainian battlefield.

Then the White House last week asked the Army delegation to also help kickstart peace negotiations with Trump envoy Steve Witkoff, a U.S.

official tells NPR.

The official was not authorized to speak publicly.

Since Driscoll is an Army combat veteran, the sense was this delegation could more easily relate to the Ukrainian officers.

The news of their trip comes amid reports of a new U.S.-Russia peace plan that calls for Ukraine to give up the rest of the Donbass area to Russia and also accept a smaller army.

NPR has not confirmed the plan, first reported by the Financial Times.

Tom Bowman, NPR News.