Version: (using KDE 4.3.2) OS: Linux Installed from: Ubuntu Packages Just enable "offline cache mode", clear cache and load page. Konqueror will connect to the Internet and show loaded page.
AFAIU the cache policy does not tell konqueror to not load anything from the web, but instead in "offline mode" it tells it to not re-download the page if it is allready in the cache. In your test, the cache is empty, therefore konqi needs to download the page. The cache policy is not an "offline mode" of the network.