Editing M50 Super Sherman (section)

==History==
Class: Medium Tank</br>
Developed: 1955-1956</br>
Service: 1956-1973</br>
Vehicles Built: cca 100</br>
Operators: Israel, Chile, South Lebanon Army

The M50 Sherman (incorrectly but commonly known as Isherman or Super Sherman) is a French Sherman variant, developed for the Israelis in 1955. Ever since the Independence War of 1948, the IDF has been an avid user of the American M4 Sherman Medium Tank with dozens of vehicles of several variants acquired from all over the world (the earliest ones were even salvaged from Italian scrap yards). These would serve well in 1948 against poorly armed Arabs, but the Soviet Union started to arm Israel's enemies in the 1950s with some truly fearsome weaponry, including the T-34/85 tanks. In order to keep up, Israel and France worked together to increase the Sherman combat value.

The most important and noticeable change was the weapon replacement. The original 75mm guns were switched to the French 75mm CN-75-50 cannons. These were modern, potent weapons, derived from the famous "long 75mm" of the German Panther tank. The Israeli Shermans also underwent an overhaul to prolong their service life. The process was, however, quite slow and it took 5 years (1956 to 1961) to deliver approximately 100 such refitted tanks. By 1965, all M50s also received a new Cummins engine (these would be known as M50 Mk.2 or M50 Cummins).

In battle, the M50s performed reasonably well against late World War Two era threats such as the T-34s, but with the appearance of new threats such as the American-supplied Pattons and the Soviet T-54/55 tanks, even the upgraded M50s became completely outclassed with the preferred Israeli tactic (sniping at vulnerable spots using superior gun performance and rigorous training) no longer being applicable and forcing them to fight enemies at close range, suffering high losses in the process. Regardless, the M50s took part in both the 1956 Suez Crisis and the 1967 Six-Day War.

Some were still in service with several reserve units during the 1973 Yom Kippur War, but by that time, they were hopelessly obsolete They were withdrawn from active service after the war and some of them were converted to fixed emplacements (effectively hollowed out tank hulls with functional turrets). A bunch of M50s were given to the South Lebanon Army and some militias during the mid-1970s Lebanese Civil War, from where a lot of them were sold to private collectors. And, last but not least, around a hundred were sold to Chile.