What we really need is a tank with an effective anti missile system. From watching the Syrian civil war tanks are pretty much garbage against modern missiles.
Protection: Here’s where the light tank will benefit the most from technological innovation. Active protection systems such as the Israeli Trophy and Russian Arena, which use radar antennas to track enemy rockets and missiles and shoot them down with shotgun-like blasts, can protect a small tank just as well as a large one. That means that a modern U.S. light tank could dispense with much of its armor—perhaps keeping just enough to stop 12.7-millimeter heavy machine gun bullets. For larger projectiles, an active protection system would keep the tank crew safe.
http://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a22337/us-army-new-light-tank/
The Russians and Israelis have them and they work well. The Syrian tanks are old export models that did not have any of the Russian anti-missile systems or provisions for them.
The Obama DOD trialed the Israeli Trophy system on US tanks and other vehicles, but didn’t want to buy anything from Israel no matter how well it worked. They decided to wait and acquire a vapor ware system from Raytheon that we still don’t have deployed yet.
And likewise for Yemen. Several more than one Saudi Abrams take a hit. Not much left of tank. The RPG-30 series is totally devastating. Ask the Ukrainians as well...