One could argue that the tank in modern warfare is, with the advent of reactive armor, is actually the tank.
They go onto the field of battle, and they force people to deal with them or bad things happen to them.
That being said, trying to argue that a tank shouldn't exist in game combat because the same concept doesn't exist in real-world combat while having no problem with the extensive list of elements in D&D that have no equivalent in real-world combat is, in my opinion, a rather intellectually dishonest point to take.
They go onto the field of battle, and they force people to deal with them or bad things happen to them.
That being said, trying to argue that a tank shouldn't exist in game combat because the same concept doesn't exist in real-world combat while having no problem with the extensive list of elements in D&D that have no equivalent in real-world combat is, in my opinion, a rather intellectually dishonest point to take.