The clan was dishonored and deserved to disband, but the individuals did not deserve to die. Azai never explicitly explains all the details, but that's simply because in the time-line of the game, Azai believed that the ninja already knew everything, so why bother explaining again? Kennedy simply the work of a warped, solitary young man, or was something more nefarious afoot? Before you continue reading please note that this thread will contain end-game spoilers. But yes, the version where Azai has been keeping his original intention of stealing their technology secret from most of the clan until they had it, does seem a bit more likely.
nest...