The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Desolate \Des"o*late\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Desolated; p. pr. &
   vb. n. Desolating.]
   1. To make desolate; to leave alone; to deprive of
      inhabitants; as, the earth was nearly desolated by the
      flood.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. To lay waste; to ruin; to ravage; as, a fire desolates a
      city.
      [1913 Webster]

            Constructed in the very heart of a desolating war.
                                                  --Sparks.
      [1913 Webster]

Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:

46 Moby Thesaurus words for "desolating":
   agonizing, baneful, calamitous, cataclysmal, cataclysmic,
   catastrophic, consuming, consumptive, deadly, demolishing,
   demolitionary, depredatory, destroying, destructive, devastating,
   disastrous, doomful, excruciating, fatal, fateful, fratricidal,
   harrowing, heartbreaking, heartrending, heartsickening,
   heartwounding, internecine, nihilist, nihilistic, racking,
   ravaging, rending, ruining, ruinous, self-destructive,
   subversionary, subversive, suicidal, tormenting, torturous,
   vandalic, vandalish, vandalistic, wasteful, wasting, withering