[selcuka]

> dialects are killed off through standardized education etc.

Sorry, I didn't mean that it would be a smooth transition. It might even be impossible. What I wrote above is (paraphrasing myself) "Once you switch to a phonetic respelling [...] pronunciation [will not] tend to diverge over time [that much]". "Once you switch" is the key.

> To do this in English would e.g. force all Australians, Englishmen etc. to speak like an American

Why? There is nothing that prevents Australians from spelling some words differently (as we currently do, e.g. colour vs color, or tyre vs tire).