make distcheck failure

[Bruce Korb]

My tool versions, an edited transcript with the failure message and then a help 
request.

$ for f in autoconf automake libtool ; do $f --version | head -1 ; done
autoconf (GNU Autoconf) 2.68
automake (GNU automake) 1.11.1
libtool (GNU libtool) 2.4

> chmod -R a-w autogen-5.16pre15; chmod a+w autogen-5.16pre15
> mkdir autogen-5.16pre15/_build
> mkdir autogen-5.16pre15/_inst
> chmod a-w autogen-5.16pre15
> test -d autogen-5.16pre15/_build || exit 0; \
> dc_install_base=`CDPATH="${ZSH_VERSION+.}:" && cd autogen-5.16pre15/_inst && 
> pwd | sed -e 's,^[^:\\/]:[\\/],/,'` \
>   && dc_destdir="${TMPDIR-/tmp}/am-dc-$$/" \
>   && am__cwd=`pwd` \
>   && CDPATH="${ZSH_VERSION+.}:" && cd autogen-5.16pre15/_build \
>   && ../configure --srcdir=.. --prefix="$dc_install_base" \
>      \
> [[...]]
> configure: loading site script /usr/share/site/x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu
> [[...]]
> config.status: creating xml2ag/Makefile
> config.status: creating xml2ag/test/Makefile
> config.status: creating config.h
> config.status: executing depfiles commands
> config.status: executing libtool commands
> config.status: executing stamp-h commands
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Configuration:
>
>   Source code location:   ..
>   Compiler:               gcc -std=gnu99
>   Compiler flags:         -g -O2 -Wall -Werror -Wcast-align 
> -Wmissing-prototypes -Wpointer-arith -Wshadow -Wstrict-prototypes 
> -Wwrite-strings -Wno-format-contains-nul -fno-strict-aliasing 
> -Wstrict-aliasing=2
>   Host System Type:       x86_64-suse-linux-gnu
>   Install path:           /old-home/bkorb/ag/ag/autogen-5.16pre15/_inst
>
>   See config.h for further configuration information.
> [[...]]
> make[2]: Leaving directory 
> `/old-home/bkorb/ag/ag/autogen-5.16pre15/_build/getdefs'
> Making uninstall in xml2ag
> make[2]: Entering directory 
> `/old-home/bkorb/ag/ag/autogen-5.16pre15/_build/xml2ag'
> make[2]: *** No rule to make target `uninstall'.  Stop.
> make[2]: Leaving directory 
> `/old-home/bkorb/ag/ag/autogen-5.16pre15/_build/xml2ag'
> make[1]: *** [uninstall-recursive] Error 1
> make[1]: Leaving directory `/old-home/bkorb/ag/ag/autogen-5.16pre15/_build'
> make: *** [distcheck] Error 1
> FAILURE: make distcheck

xml2ag/Makefile no longer exists.  Removing it is not in any of my clean rules.
How do I figure out the cause?  I can send the build log, but it is kind-of 
verbose
(4,100 lines).  Just for additional info, if I do a "make uninstall" from
my build directory (not using "make distcheck"), then it all works as expected.
It is just the uninstall within the distcheck.  (The "Makefile.in" files all 
match
between the build directory and the distcheck untar tree and the Makefile.in
is present in the xml2ag directory and xml2ag is in the subdir list.)

> $ find ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/ -type f -name Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/agen5/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/agen5/test/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/getdefs/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/getdefs/test/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/autoopts/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/autoopts/test/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/pkg/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/snprintfv/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/xml2ag/test/Makefile <<< Oops!!  No parent
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/columns/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/compat/Makefile
> ag/autogen-5.16pre16/_build/doc/Makefile