The US has killed Al Qaeda’s No. 2 again. Does it even matter?

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NEED TO KNOW:

American counterterrorism officials are celebrating again. Al Qaeda confirmed in a video released on Tuesday that the leader of its affiliate in Yemen — the most dangerous branch of the world's most storied terrorist organization — was killed in a US drone strike.

Nasser al-Wuhayshi had led Al Qaeda in Yemen since 2002 and was the global network's second-highest ranking leader. So it's a big deal. And it comes a day after a US missile strike reportedly killed another high-profile terrorist in Libya.

The apparent deaths (nothing is ever certain when you are killing people remotely) would serve as evidence of the success of the American counterterrorism strategy if such men weren't so easily replaced. Al Qaeda in Yemen announced in its video that Qassim al-Raimi, its former military commander, would be taking over.

The United States has a long history now of taking out terrorist leaders. But terrorist groups remain and terrorist attacks continue. US President Barack Obama kind of acknowledged this problem earlier this year at a major counterterrorism conference in Washington, DC. He called on the world to do more to solve the root problems that inspire terrorism and allow terrorist leaders to recruit so easily: like poverty, hunger, displacement, human rights abuses, and corruption, to name a few examples.

WANT TO KNOW:

Sometimes killing terrorist leaders can just make things worse.

Case in point: In 2008, a US missile killed Aden Hashi Ayro, then the leader of Al Shabaab in Somalia. The organization quickly replaced him with Ahmed Godane. And in the following few years, Godane transformed Al Shabaab from a national nuisance to a transnational Al Qaeda affiliate capable of carrying out devastating attacks.

Godane pulled off the 2013 Westgate Mall attack in Nairobi, Kenya. In that attack, which was witnessed by reporters, gunmen killed 67 people. In 2014, a US missile strike killed Godane, which surely came as a relief to counterterrorism officials. Al Shabaab, however, had many a man waiting in line. Ahmed Umar took Godane's place and on one morning in early April, Al Shabaab demonstrated its resilience.

As most of the students at Kenya's Garissa University College still slept, Al Shabaab gunmen stormed the campus, fighting past security and into the dorms. Almost 150 people — many of them students — were killed.

Yet the US counterterrorism strategy seems to value most the killing of terrorist leaders. In the Yemen example, the strategy has had devastating results. So it could continue launching missile strikes on Al Qaeda in Yemen, the United States partnered with Yemen's former president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, helping him stay in power. But Saleh was a deeply corrupt authoritarian ruler who had led the country for decades. During that time, Yemen became one of the poorest places on the planet.

There are few better places for Al Qaeda to recruit than among people who are destitute and abandoned. Today, Yemen is not only wracked by poverty and hunger — it is consumed by conflict. And Al Qaeda has taken advantage. It now enjoys full control over the country's fifth-largest city.

STRANGE BUT TRUE:

When it comes to understanding gender, Thailand — indeed much of Southeast Asia — is often way ahead of the West. Here is a wonderful example: In Thailand, school students wear uniforms. It's simple. Boys wear slacks and girls wear skirts. But what about transgender students? One of Thailand's top universities has an easy solution. Students can wear whichever uniform they want. “We’re ready for our transgender students to come and learn,” the school explains on its Facebook page. “Just dress in a neat fashion.”

Transgender students often find acceptance in Thai schools, writes GlobalPost Senior Correspondent Patrick Winn. Teachers, for instance, will often address them by their preferred pronoun. But the uniform thing has always been a grey area. The university that is finally addressing this problem — and here is perhaps the strange part of this story — has even released photos to serve as guidelines for students. It's all kind of amazing and inspiring.

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