That would be supplicant-dependent, right? For example the Intel supplicant which I tried some time ago had a very solid opinion about what was going on and I couldn't use the net "just like that". OTOH, there is this peculiarity in the IEEE 802.1X standard itself that basically says the supplicant tries three times to authenticate with EAP-Identity, and after that shall "assume that the port is open". Maybe that's what happens.
Well that is true, I guess I'm only familiar with Windows supplicants.
Anyway, it is a *very* bad idea to rely on such behaviour. I suggest a bucket of cold water into the face of the guy's management. An authentication server is used to authenticate users, not to non-authenticate users.
Once again, we're not relying on it - this is an emergency procedure, to be used in emergencies only. We're talking about availability as a component of security here. There is nothing wrong with a documented, tested plan for an emergency situation.
Greetings,
Stefan Winter