re: #11 Love-Child of Cassandra and Sisyphus

We spend a lot of money on warfare research:

Transparent ceramic armor provides superior ballistic protection over traditional glass laminates

Note: aluminium oxynitride is not the same as just aluminum. It is not unusual for aluminum compounds to be transparent - aluminum oxide (sapphire, ruby) is a very common substance in the Earth’s crust, and without the impurities that give it pretty colors it is clear to visible light.

Sapphire and ruby are just under diamond on the Moh’s hardness scale, at nine. But they are brittle. Don’t be surprised to see carbon-carbon thread introduced to ALON to make it tougher (In the geologic sense of ‘tough’. Jade is ‘tough’. Beat it with a sledge hammer and it powders instead of shattering. A ‘tough’ transparent armor with a hardness of 8+ is the Holy Grail of vehicle (and aircraft) armor, especially if it retains its strength when cast in curves.