pam_ldap: What if LDAP server not reachable?

[Johnny Morano <johnny.morano@vlaanderen.be>]

Howdy...

I'm playing at bit with PAM (for the first time) and after 3 days now,
/me is going bananas, seriously... 
myProblem: I use pam_ldap to authenticate users against an LDAP server.
This nice redhat 8.0 installation f**** up my network settings if i
specify module options in /etc/modules.conf. This is the least of my
probs. BUT, if my network doesn't get enabled, i'm also not enable to
reach the LDAP server. You would think: 'but you can still login as
root, right?'... wrong. i can't login as root, which makes boot in
single user mode, enable all the network stuff manually and login as
root. you know, once all the network stuff is enabled and working, i
have no problems logging in as root (which is a local account), but i
the network is down, /me == :(

does anybody know a solution?

tia,
johnny -bananas- morano

this is my (the default redhat) pam config file:
#%PAM-1.0
# This file is auto-generated.
# User changes will be destroyed the next time authconfig is run.
auth        required      /lib/security/pam_env.so
auth        sufficient    /lib/security/pam_unix.so likeauth nullok
auth        sufficient    /lib/security/pam_ldap.so use_first_pass
auth        required      /lib/security/pam_deny.so

account     required      /lib/security/pam_unix.so
account     [default=bad success=ok user_unknown=ignore
service_err=ignore system_err=ignore]
/lib/security/pam_ldap.so

password    required      /lib/security/pam_cracklib.so retry=3 type=
password    sufficient    /lib/security/pam_unix.so nullok use_authtok
md5 shadow
password    sufficient    /lib/security/pam_ldap.so use_authtok
password    required      /lib/security/pam_deny.so

session     required      /lib/security/pam_limits.so
session     required      /lib/security/pam_unix.so
session     optional      /lib/security/pam_ldap.so