Nothing is better then experience. 90% of whats being said is "on paper" Im an American so ill go with the Abrams because i believe its the best because its proven itself time and time again. Israel would come in a close second with their merkava MK 3 BAZ becaouse these tanks have actualy seen battle and proven themselfs. People think whats newer and more advanced is better, thats not always true. Countries that constantly fight like America know exactly whats needed for a battle and what isnt. Some of these tanks from other nations are damn nice looking and advanced but tell me, what do they really know about war and what works?

yeah but on problem with that, the abrams has only fought old soviet tanks nothing new, the merkava and isreal have to deal with all there neighboring countries and there brand new tanks, so compared to isreal the US hasn't fought very much since the end of the Vietnam war, isreal and all that middle eastern countries get into a small war just about every year, and so far nothing has come close to the merkava, i can't wait to see the MK4, but i just think , and i live in Alaska so i am an american, that the Leopard 2 and it's verious models and the Merkava are the badest tanks on the playing field . especialy since they have modular armor which the abrams doesn't have

I dont think so. Iraq was the most powerful arab country in the world it had the 4th largest army and i highly doubt iran or syria have more advanced tanks then them. Plus Israel doesent fight large scale wars they fight small little battles. Your not going to see israel have 1000+ tanks in action at once. And your not going to see them destroy a country like we did Iraq they simply defend themselfs, so no i doubt they have more experience then us. In small scale conflicts they have far more experience but when it comes to destroying a countries entire military they have none. You gotta remember in those small conflicts only a tiny percent of their tankers are getting experience. So they probally have some incredible tankers and some just good ones. But in Major conflict most of our tankers are seeing battle.

actually they have wiped out entire countries military forces before, Syria in the early 70's is one, we have only , barely, with help, wiped out germany ,japan and italy, and then in Iraq we just killed there military force which was a bunch of old T-72 tanks and some BMP 2's, both of which our bradley could and have killed before, so our infantry fighting can kill their MBT's , yet isreal's tanks have to stand up to countries who tank older tanks for no money at all and then they upgrade them with modern everything, including armor, and make much better tanks then they used to be, so all of the countries neighboring isreal have newer designs for older tanks that make them much for effective, like the M50 Super Sherman, and ontop of that, the Merkava can withstand a salvo of about 7 RPG rockets, our abrams can't, the leopard , i haven't heard naything, but the Merkava can also carry infantry into battle which makes it a very viable, ad powerful tank, especialy with it's modular armor, and with all the small wars that go on, they do use more of there tanks then we do ours, they just use them over time, basicly they keep all their experiance and get more, the US get's into a war every other 10 or so years, which is way to long if you want experiance, plus the t-80's can damage the abrams, not kill it mind you, but at least make our crews evac from the vehicle, the merkava, hasn't had a single tank kill one, the only ones that i heard of that were killed were form mines and mas AT infantry rocket fire, if the US made a tank like the merkava, then we would have the badest tank on the market, but with the way isreal is always getting fought with, they know what a tank needs, and speed isn't always a top factor, but it is one of the three big factors for tanks

PS , isreal has the highest concentration of tanks per square mile/kilomter, so it honestly would be the most powerful, all Iraq had was a buncha caviar cans waiting to blow up

I have trouble seeing how a modified sherman is gona stand up to a t-72 considering it was probally one of the worst tanks of ww2. And Israel is a small country that ratio dont mean much. They have that many tanks because without those tanks their survival would be in question. The only military in that region besides israel with "advanced" tanks would be Egypt with their abrams and as far as i know Israel and Egypt are on somewhat good terms. And even tho we defeated them in 100 hours, in world terms Iraqs tank force was considered pretty good. If the iraqi tanks were pieces of shit the Abrams wouldnt have the reputation it has now. Dont forget before the war people questioned the Abrams, after the war it was considered the best. And that rpg shit in iraq was just blind luck. Im sure an abrams could take far more then 7 rpg blast as long as you didnt get a extremely luck under turret shot.

And we didn't "barely" wipe out germany and japan, we completely crushed them. It took time and many lifes but their is no "barely" about it.
I recommend looking at some ww2 pictures of berlin for an example. Canada probally had a larger military at the end of ww2 then germany.

mod edit: Big Z: please dont make back to back posts. if you have something further to say, you can edit the first post to put it in.

i was refering to the fact that we had Russia, France, Britain, Many african countries and just about every other country in the world help us , or do there small part, russia and there defeating the germans for the most crushing blows, the us for outproducing them, britain for killing the airforce, not one single country has been announced as the destroyer of germany, or japan, or italy, at least 3 other countries were involved of the destruction of those three, but not single country defeated them
i know what WWII looks like, both my grandfathers served in WWII , one of them retired as an E-9 about 20 years ago, second highest rank in the airforce, he was army aircorps, he didn't like what he did, but he did it

and the T-72, had less amor than most snowblowers, our bradley has killed them with it's main gun, that's a 25 mm autocannon
there is documented proof, if the abrams goes against actual tanks, not tins caviar cans, like the Black Eagle, ,Leclerc, Leopard 2, challenger 2 or Osorio, and yes, shermans did go against T-72's, and won, they were modified, but only in firepower and mobility, they were called Super Shermans or M50 shermans, and they had a reputation for knocking out anyting from Shermans, to Pattons, to Centurions, all the way to T-72's now the T-80 or T-90 might be a question, but the shermans did take on the "revolutionary russian T-72" and won, i have a tanks buyer's buide, gotta love 'em

mod edit: sigh: and please dont make back to back posts either. if you have something further to say, you can edit the first post to put it in.

Lets try not to share this kind of stuff.