This makes NetBSD's make(1) behaviour when encountering stale depend from only printing error and continuing build, to exiting build. Stale dependency should be considred as an erroneous state of build (object) tree.

make-stale-fail.patch

Index: usr.bin/make/dir.c
===================================================================
RCS file: /cvsroot/src/usr.bin/make/dir.c,v
retrieving revision 1.65
diff -u -p -r1.65 dir.c
--- usr.bin/make/dir.c  12 Jun 2012 19:21:50 -0000      1.65    
+++ usr.bin/make/dir.c  10 Feb 2013 06:45:36 -0000
@@ -1463,9 +1463,15 @@ Dir_MTime(GNode *gn, Boolean recheck)
                         * so that we give that to the compiler.
                         */      
                        gn->path = bmake_strdup(fullName);
+#ifdef XXX_IGNORE_STALE_DEPEND
                        fprintf(stdout,
                                "%s: ignoring stale %s for %s, found %s\n",
                                progname, makeDependfile, gn->name, fullName);
+#else
+                       Error("Stale %s for %s, found %s", makeDependfile,
+                             gn->name, fullName);
+                       exit(1);
+#endif 
                    }       
                }       
            }       
Index: usr.bin/make/job.c
===================================================================
RCS file: /cvsroot/src/usr.bin/make/job.c,v
retrieving revision 1.169
diff -u -p -r1.169 job.c
--- usr.bin/make/job.c  6 Feb 2013 16:36:01 -0000       1.169   
+++ usr.bin/make/job.c  10 Feb 2013 06:45:36 -0000
@@ -1232,9 +1232,14 @@ Job_CheckCommands(GNode *gn, void (*abor
            static const char msg[] = ": don't know how to make";
   
            if (gn->flags & FROM_DEPEND) {
+#ifdef XXX_IGNORE_STALE_DEPEND
                fprintf(stdout, "%s: ignoring stale %s for %s\n",
                        progname, makeDependfile, gn->name);
                return TRUE;
+#else
+               Error("Stale %s for %s\n", makeDependfile, gn->name);
+               exit(1);
+#endif 
            }       
   
            if (gn->type & OP_OPTIONAL) {