The second link is based on a book from 2007 that used FOIA requests to be able to study the patches, so part of the point is that it's nothing new...
Anyway, I don't fall into the camp that takes the patches very seriously -- in general, anything a covert organization/project projects about itself is bound to be either propaganda or misinformation.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6880117
The second link is based on a book from 2007 that used FOIA requests to be able to study the patches, so part of the point is that it's nothing new...
Anyway, I don't fall into the camp that takes the patches very seriously -- in general, anything a covert organization/project projects about itself is bound to be either propaganda or misinformation.