Ignore dependencies while download only (feature request?)

[Yair Yarom <irush@cs.huji.ac.il>]

Hi,

Is there a way to tell apt-get to ignore dependencies when in download-only
mode? 

I want to use apt to download deb files from several sources
(e.g. snapshot.debian.org) without changing the main sources.list, where I'll
install them manually using dpkg. I've set up an alternative apt.conf with
different directories and different config files for that, but it won't let me
download anything as nothing is installed...

Is there a better solution other than recompiling apt with an "ignore
dependencies" patch? 

Thanks,
    Yair.