“Warfare in the industrial age requires a careful balance of mass and quality.

A single perfect tank cannot offer the same combat power as ten adequate but imperfect tanks. Most American tankers would have preferred to be sitting on a more powerful tank like the Panther, but no commander would have been content to substituted his many Shermans for a much smaller number of Panthers.
“The Chrysler Corporation history of their tank building effort in World War II concluded that ‘our tanks were better because the Germans never learned to think in terms of reliability as we use the word, that is, maximum performance with minimum care and replacement. . . .’
“The Sherman was ultimately a better weapon than heavier German tanks like the Panther since it could be fielded in adequate numbers to carry out its many and varied missions and was technically adequate to do its job. The Sherman was built in such large numbers that it could also be used to fill our the separate tank battalions attached to the infantry divisions; German infantry divisions were lucky to get a company of StuG III assault guns.
“On top of this, the Sherman was the backbone of the British, Canadian, French, and Polish armored divisions in 1943-45 and provided a useful supplement to the Red Army in 1944-45. The combat power of American infantry divisions was substantially enhanced by routine tank support from Sherman battalions, boosting the combat power of the U.S. Army on the battlefield.
“The Sherman was not the best tank of World War II, but it was good enough.”
— Steven Zaloga, in the final chapter of his book Armored Thunderbolt