US Vice President Joe Biden has talked to Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi in a bid to calm tensions over remarks made by the Pentagon chief who accused Iraqi troops of lacking the “will to fight” the ISIL Takfiri terrorists.

On Sunday, US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter blamed the Iraqi military for the fall of the city of Ramadi.

"They were not outnumbered. In fact, they vastly outnumbered the opposing force, and yet they failed to fight, they withdrew from the site, and that says to me, and I think to most of us, that we have an issue with the will of the Iraqis to fight ISIL and defend themselves," Carter told CNN.

In his telephone talk on Monday, Biden reassured al-Abadi that the US still supports Iraq’s government and recognizes “the enormous sacrifice and bravery of Iraqi forces over the past 18 months in Ramadi and elsewhere,” according to a White House statement.

Biden also said that Washington welcomed Iraq’s decision “to mobilize additional troops, honor those who have fallen, and prepare for counter-attack operations.”

The American top official pledged that the US would provide training and equipment at a faster clip so that Iraq can deal with the terrorists’ use of truck bombs deployed during the group's takeover of the Anbar capital.

Ramadi, located at about 110 kilometers west of capital Baghdad, fell into the hands of the ISIL militants last week and Iraqi military has launched several counter-offensives in a bid to take the strategic city back.

In an estimate by the Pentagon, when Iraqi troops abandoned Ramadi, they left behind a half-dozen tanks, a similar number of artillery pieces, a larger number of armored personnel carriers and about 100 wheeled vehicles like Humvees.

AT/AGB