The wives of many leaders tend to be important politically and have a hand in the nation's affairs, but its a large leap to claim that means they ran it.
She was important absolutely, but the article was just using too much hyperbole.
also the army stat was complete bs, we know they were not in need of resorting to female soldiers due to their large enough population.
In older societies it was common to view women as playing a central role in bringing great ruin or great fortune to men, and by extension "their" empires, for this very reason.
Honestly, even if we don't talk about it, it still is this way. If you want to achieve success, the single most important decision you make is who you marry.
I don't think it is, not just women in particular but also bureaucrats and diplomats in general is what actually ran and does still run empires and nations. Today you'd call it the administrative state. Both historically as well as today people vastly overstate the importance of visible leaders and vastly underestimate the role that administrators, managers, and so on play.