God Wants Babies Killed and Women Raped (Isaiah 13)

I'm not intentionally going in an anti Pro-Life direction here.  I'm just following the themes that come up in my Bible reading plan.

Isaiah 13

In this oracle, Isaiah sees God mustering an army to execute his judgment on his enemies (Babylon).  Granted, God is using another nation to smite these people, but Isaiah leaves no doubt that God is the general ordering these troops (3-5):


I myself have commanded my consecrated ones,
   and have summoned my mighty men to execute my anger...

The LORD of hosts is mustering
   a host for battle...
the LORD and the weapons of his indignation,
   to destroy the whole land.

What does this punishment of God on sinful people look like?  Brutal and merciless!


Behold, the day of the LORD comes,
   cruel, with wrath and fierce anger,
to make the land a desolation
   and to destroy its sinners from it....
I will punish the world for its evil,
   and the wicked for their iniquity;
I will put an end to the pomp of the arrogant,
    and lay low the pompous pride of the ruthless.
I will make people more rare than fine gold,
   and mankind than the gold of Ophir.
Therefore I will make the heavens tremble,
   and the earth will be shaken out of its place,
at the wrath of the LORD of hosts
   in the day of his fierce anger.
Whoever is found will be thrust through,
   and whoever is caught will fall by the sword.
Their infants will be dashed in pieces
   before their eyes;
their houses will be plundered
   and their wives ravished.

[The Medes'] bows will slaughter the young men;
   they will have no mercy on the fruit of the womb;
   their eyes will not pity children.


Here we see God actively planning and orchestrating the cruel slaughter of men, women, and, yes, children.  Here God ordains that the army of the Medes kill the Babylonians by impaling them with spears and chopping them to bits with swords.  It is God's express will that the Medes smash the Babylonians' kids into pieces before their eyes and steal their possessions and rape their women.

Is God being kind and loving and merciful to sinners here?  Is God being mean and nasty and unjust?  What could the Babylonians have possibly done to DESERVE such a fate?  Can anyone DESERVE something like this?