The manner of using - gently, sparingly etc - may count more than the specific brand of cleaner...
I agree with that completely. Proper technique counts for a lot.
I think that the photographic field is to blame for much of this angst. There is a certain percentage of photographers that mistreat their cameras in general, and clean their camera lenses by rubbing off the dust with the tail of their shirt, dry, while preparing for a shot, and only once in a blue moon, if ever, would use a liquid lens cleaner and cotton swabs. We've all seen the results of this: a rubbed-off coating and a multitude of fine scratches on the glass. And that's before the modern softer multicoatings. The simplistic conclusion is that the lenses have experienced too much cleaning, when really it was just bad cleaning.
As microscopists, we dread the same thing happening to our prized objectives, so we get all in a dither about how to prevent this, and the rumors fly:
1. Cotton is good/bad; Kim-Wipes should never be used, they contain silica particles; or is that just shop rags, or paper towels, or Kleenex? Microfiber is good (it's absorbant and soft), or bad (it holds abrasives). Never rub in a zig-zag motion, only in a circular one (presumably so the inevitable scratches are in a neat circular pattern...)
2. One should not be satisfied with only a hand lens and penlight to inspect the cleaning job, OMG; you have to use a Bertrand lens, or a stereo microscope and a sophisticated lighting scheme to inspect it; really, the only way is to examine the lens with an SEM. (Of course, the lens will be ruined by the overcoating, but heck, at least you know it's clean before you throw it away.)
3. Cleaning fluids: not too long ago, a thread had some claiming that Zeiss lens cleaner should never be used: it contained alcohol (horrors!); it was now made in China; the formula had been changed, it would now eat the sophisticated multi-coating right off your lens, etc., etc. Other solvents will do the same (Windex window cleaner with ammonia, zylene, alcohol, naphtha), plus your lens elements will fall apart. Since all solvents are suspect, none should be used; we should only use those expensive molecular peel-off coatings. Oh wait, those (a friend of someone my cousin knew said) have ruined coatings, delaminated lenses, put a giant hole in your wallet, etc.
PeteM, I've used Kim-Wipes for years for cleaning off immersion oil and telescope mirrors, and have never noticed any damage. But again, it comes down to technique. If your objective end has dirt and crud on the metal around the lens, you can easily wipe this across the lens; or your mirror is covered with fine dust/sand and you don't prewash it, under running water say, before a final cleaning with cleaner and the Kim-Wipes, you again can wipe grit across the surface.
(for the record, I use canned air, Q-Tips (made in the US), Kim-Wipes, and Zeiss lens cleaner, and have never scratched a camera or microscope lens, nor a first surface mirror (he asserts wildly.)