Turkmenistan has signed a defense deal with Russia to purchase six Smerch multiple rocket launcher systems for $70 million, Russia's Kommersant media outlet reported June 24. The deal is the first major military-technical deal between Russia and Turkmenistan in a decade and is meant to not only tighten relations between the two, but show Turkmenistan's neighbors that the desert state is about to have some teeth. Turkmenistan is a sparsely populated desert state slightly smaller than Texas located in the heart of Central Asia and bordered to the west by the landlocked Caspian Sea. From 1991, when it gained independence from the fallen Soviet Union, until 2006, the country was almost completely isolated and ruled by one very eccentric man, the now-deceased President Saparmurat Niyazov — better known as the "Turkmenbashi," or "Father of all Turkmen.