Damir Sagolj / Reuters

A U.S. Marine drinks the blood of a cobra during a jungle survival exercise with the Thai Navy as part of the "Cobra Gold 2013" joint military exercise, at a military base in Chon Buri province, Thailand.

These beastly feasts exist somewhere between the hard edge of gunpoint diplomacy and the soft belly of “Man v. Food.”

In Thailand, some Americans recently munched jungle grubs and guzzled snake blood alongside Thai military members. In Afghanistan, 13 U.S. men were invited by locals to slice the throats of goats, and they later reciprocated by offering steaming bowls of their own exotic fare: Ramen noodles.

The common denominator: The U.S. Marine Corps.

“We’re bred from the beginning to do what it takes to become one with the local populace and win over their trust,” said former Marine Sgt. Thomas Brennan.

In 2010, while serving with a dozen other Marines and seven Afghan National Police members in the Musa Qala district, town members politely asked one of Brennan’s men to kill a goat — part of a sacred custom on a Muslim holiday. The Marine complied, spilling fresh blood on the street as nearby Afghani men chanted Muslim prayers. Later, the entire group shared cooked goat meat inside a small dwelling.

“We were more than willing to be part of their culture because we had that team mentality that we needed to develop” with the Afghan National Police, Brennan said. “From there on out, we shared more dinners with them.”

The same ethic led a group of Marines late last month to kill king cobras and drink the snakes’ blood in a Thai jungle as members of the Royal Thai Marines cheered. The event was part of an annual joint training exercise called Cobra Gold that teaches jungle-survival skills and other field exercises. 

Units from the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps — numbering about 9,500 service members — participated along with troops from Singapore, Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand, said First Lt. Gregory H. Carroll, a Marine Corps spokesman.

“The jungle provides a number of animals and some are common to us like birds, fish and even some reptiles,” U.S. Army Sgt. Daniel A. Hernandez told dvidshub.net, a website that provides military-oriented content. “However, if you’re not a good hunter, there are smaller prey you can eat like insects, such as grasshoppers, cockroaches, scorpions, larva, worms and beetles.”

In Afghanistan, the goat butchering came after the Marines had given some rice and bread to the town members as part of the Muslim holiday.

“The Afghan National Police saw that we were caring about the locals when it came to the holiday and they invited us to their celebration. For the (police) commander and his higher echelon, it meant a lot and they were more willing to incorporate with us and share their culture,” Brennan said.

But Marine food swaps can work both ways.

Brennan’s unit offered the Afghan National Police members a few of the morsels that their families had sent from America: cans of Chef Boyardee pasta.

The post-taste reaction among the Afghanistan locals may have mirrored the faces of the Marines who recently sipped snake blood in Thailand.

“They thought,” Brennan said, “it was the grossest stuff in the world.”

Related: 

• Female Marines shoot rifles, swim in uniform at boot camp
• Medal for cyber troops draws jibes, dismay, 'Whiskey Tango Foxtrots'

The accused founder and operator of a hardcore child porn distribution site was charged in a New Jersey court Monday on 32 counts of child exploitation, money laundering and related offenses after being extradited from Thailand, prosecutors announced.

Ukrainian citizen Maksym Shynkarenko, 33, was arrested in Thailand in 2009 for the material distributed internationally through an array of web sites which featured photographs and videos of children being sexually assaulted and abused.

Follow @msnbc_us

Follow Kari Huus on Twitter and Facebook.

The extradition process was completed and he was moved to the United States over the weekend, New Jersey U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced in a statement on Monday.

"As the latest step in an investigation that has resulted in the convictions of more than 560 offenders from 47 states, Shynkarenko’s extradition from Thailand to a New Jersey courtroom is a milestone in one of our most important fights – keeping our children safe from harm," the statement said.

According to the indictment, a variety of web sites run by Shynkarenki, under names such as Illegal.cp, Hottest Child Porn Garden, Sick Child Room, Hualuma, and Real Child Porno offered  subscribers access to thousands of images and videos depicting the sexual abuse and exploitation of boys and girls ranging from infants to teenagers.

According to the attorney general's statement the initial page of  the site called Illegal.cp offered subscribers this advice: Upon accessing the "Illegal.CP" website, the initial: "Our site is considered to be illegal in all countries.... Even if you ever have problems with police, you can always say that someone had stolen the information from your credit card and used it. It is very difficult to establish that you were the person to pay."

Month-long ICE crackdown nets 190 child porn suspects; 18 victims rescued

From as early as December 2003 through July 2008, Shynkarenko and co-conspirators earned hundreds of thousands of dollars by selling access to child pornography, the court document said.

The indictment alleges that Shynkarenko and co-conspirators developed elaborate systems to appear as legal merchants and conceal their identity from credit card companies and law enforcement, and then deposited their earnings in banks around the world, including New Jersey, Latvia, Estonia, and the Ukraine.

The investigation, which started in 2005, was a joint effort of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey and Homeland Security Investigation unit of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to Attorney General Fishman.

It said that if convicted, Shynkarenko faces a statutory minimum penalty of five years in prison and a maximum penalty of 20 years on each of 15 counts of transportation and shipment of child pornography, and additional penalties on the other charges.

More content from msnbc.com and NBC News:

• FBI: Violent crime rates in US approach historic lows
• Four Afghan women disappear during US study program
• Hitchhiker writing 'Kindness of America' memoir shot
• Sandusky child sex-abuse trial under way
• Video: Abandoned by parents, she finds home at Harvard

Follow US News on msnbc.com on Twitter and Facebook

Follow Kari Huus on Facebook

By Robert Windrem
NBC News

Police raids in Bangkok, Thailand, which netted a suspected Hezbollah operative Thursday and the makings of bomb-making materials Saturday, represent "one of the most credible Israel-focused threats overseas in a long time," said NBC News analyst Roger Cressey, and "very much the real deal" adds NBC News analyst Mike Leiter.

The two analysts referred primarily to the Saturday raid where police confiscated more than 8,800 pounds (4,000 kilograms) of urea fertilizer and several gallons of liquid ammonium nitrate found in a warehouse in Samut Sakhon, on the western outskirts of Bangkok.

Officials in the U.S. and Israel said Hezbollah could have been planning an attack on the Israeli embassy in downtown Bangkok, near various tourist sites, say Cressey and Leiter. Hezbollah, a Shi'ite Islamist group in Lebanon backed by Syria and Iran, is on the U.S. blacklist of foreign terrorist organizations.

The raid caused both the U.S. and Israel to issue public travel warnings urging their citizens to be cautious.

Information that led to the raid was relayed to Thai police by Israeli intelligence. Police detained a Swedish national of Lebanese origin with alleged links to pro-Iranian Hezbollah militants on Thursday. The intelligence indicated a plot could be carried out between between Friday and Sunday.

Cressey said the fear was that Hezbollah was constructing a large bomb that would have caused a devastating blast in an area that many Americans visit.

"There would have been a lot of collateral damage," said Cressey, a former member of the U.S. National Security Council staff.

Moreover, both analysts note they've been told the threat may not be over, that at least one other operative is being sought. Leiter, former director of the U.S. National Counterterrorism Center, says there is a fear about plots against "secondary targets", either tourist or Jewish, in the Thai capital.

As for the rationale for the attack, Cressey said, "All theories make sense. Can't rank order them yet," while Leiter noted, "It's pretty consistent with the increase in tension between Israel and Iran." Iran has vowed revenge for the killings of its nuclear scientists, which it has blamed on Israel and the U.S.

One possibility raised by both is Hezbollah revenge for the Israeli killing on Imad Mugniyah, the Hezbollah leader who died in a car bombing in downtown Damascus nearly four years ago on February 12, 2008.  Mugniyah was responsible for many anti-American and anti-Israeli terrorist attacks, including the bombing of the U.S. embassy in Beirut in 1983, the Marine Barracks bombing in 1983 and the bombing of the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires in 1992. Hezbollah vowed revenge for that killing but never carried out attacks that it tied to Mugniyah's death.

Background on the incident from the Associated Press:

National police chief Priewpan Damapong told reporters the suspect, named as Atris Hussein, had given police an address where bomb-making material was being kept.

Priewpan said the suspect had maintained that his group had not planned an attack in Thailand but intended to transport the substances to a third country, which he would not name.

Asked about the discovery, Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra told reporters: "I have been informed. I would like to ask people not to panic. We are currently in control of the situation."

Thai officials have seemed irritated by travel advisories issued by the U.S. and Israeli governments, followed by several more since Friday. Foreign Minister Surapong Towijakchaikul said diplomats from countries that had issued warnings would meet with him for an explanation on Monday.

Tourism is a big money-earner for Thailand, and ministers are keen not to deter travelers, especially after the hit to tourism from severe flooding in 2011 and political unrest in 2010.

Yingluck also instructed the defense ministry to consult U.S. embassy officials to discuss its terror warning and seek a retraction.

However, an embassy spokesman later said the terror warning to its citizens was valid and the United States had no plan to rescind it.

Defence Minister Yuthasak Sasiprapha told reporters in the northern city of Chiang Mai on Sunday that Thailand was not the target, although officials have also said that areas of Bangkok frequented by Westerners and Israelis could be hit.

Yuthasak said that a second suspect had managed to leave the country.

Narong Sangnak / EPA

Joe Gordon, 55, looks on from inside a cell at the criminal court in Bangkok, Thailand, on Thursday.

BANGKOK - A court in Thailand sentenced a U.S. citizen to two-and-a-half years in prison Thursday for defaming the country's royal family by translating excerpts of a locally banned biography of the king and posting them online.

The verdict is the latest so-called lese majeste punishment handed down in the Southeast Asian kingdom, which has come under increasing pressure at home and abroad to reform harsh legislation that critics say is an affront to freedom of expression.

The 55-year-old Thai-born American, Joe Gordon — also known as Lerpong Wichaikhammat — stood calmly with his ankles shackled in an orange prison uniform as the sentence was read out at a Bangkok criminal court.

"The defendant is found guilty ... The court sentenced him to five years in prison. But he pleaded guilty. That makes the case easier, so the court decided to cut it in half to 2 years and six months," a judge said at the criminal court in Bangkok.

• Story: Thais divided by anti-free speech crackdown

The sentence was relatively light compared to other recent cases. In November, 61-year-old Amphon Tangnoppakul was sentenced to 20 years in jail for sending four text messages deemed offensive to the crown.

Gordon's lawyer, Anon Nampa, said there would be no appeal against the verdict. "One month from now, we'll submit a request for a royal pardon," he added.

Gordon posted links the to banned biography of King Bhumibol Adulyadej several years ago while living in the U.S. state of Colorado, and his case has raised questions about the applicability of Thai law to acts committed by foreigners outside Thailand.

Speaking after the verdict, Gordon said, "I am an American citizen, and what happened was in America." 

'This is just the system'
He also said he had no expectation of being let off easy. "This is just the system in Thailand," he said. Speaking later in Thai, he added: "In Thailand, they put people in prison even if they don't have proof."

Gordon had lived in the U.S. for about 30 years. He was detained in late May during a visit to his native country to seek treatment for arthritis and high blood pressure. After being repeatedly denied bail, he pleaded guilty in October in hopes of obtaining a lenient sentence.

Thailand's lese majeste laws are the harshest in the world. They mandate that people found guilty of defaming the monarchy — including the king, the queen and the heir to the throne — face three to 15 years behind bars. The nation's 2007 Computer Crimes Act also contains provisions that have enabled prosecutors to increase lese majeste sentences.

• Story: Man sentenced to 20 years for insulting Thai queen

The U.S. Embassy's consul general, Elizabeth Pratt, told reporters in Bangkok after the ruling that Washington considered Gordon's punishment "severe because he has been sentenced for his right to freedom of expression."

Opponents of the laws say that while the royal family should be protected from defamation, lese majeste laws have often been abused to punish political rivals. That is especially true since the nation suffered a 2006 military coup.

Asked if he would stay in Thailand after serving his time, Gordon said: "I would like to stay and see some positive Thailand. I want to see the real, amazing Thailand, not the messy Thailand."

• Photoblog: Prime minister bows to royalty

Many had hoped that the administration of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, which has some prominent supporters who have been accused of lese majeste, would reform the laws. The issue remains highly sensitive, however, and Yingluck's government has been as aggressive in pursuing the cases as its predecessors.

Last weekend, New York-based Human Rights Watch urged authorities to amend the laws, saying the penalties being meted out were "shocking."

More targets online
The rise of the Internet in recent years has given Thai authorities many more targets to pursue. Last month, Information Minister Anudith Nakornthap said Facebook users who "share" or "like" content that insults the Thai monarchy are committing a crime. Anudith said Thai authorities asked Facebook to remove 86,000 pages between August and November because of alleged lese majeste content.

The Bangkok Post reported that the Thai government said Wednesday it had set up a committee to seek out and clamp down on websites that publish content considered insulting or offensive to the monarchy.

• Story: 'Witch hunt'? Thailand cracks down on king's online critics

Gordon, a former car salesman, is accused of having translated excerpts from the unauthorized biography "The King Never Smiles," published by Yale University Press, into the Thai language and publishing them in a blog. He also provided links to the translation to other two Web forums, prosecutors say.

In the banned book, author Paul M. Handley retraces the king's life, alleging that he has been a major stumbling block to the progress of democracy in Thailand as he consolidated royal power over his long reign.

Bhumibol, the world's longest-reigning monarch, is profoundly revered in Thailand and is widely seen as a stabilizing force. He was feted Monday on his 84th birthday, during which he called on his countrymen to unite in response to the worst floods in more than half a century.

The king is frail and has stayed at a Bangkok hospital for more than two years.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

Read more content from msnbc.com and NBC News:

• PhotoBlog: Pearl Harbor from above, 1941 and 2011
• $50,000 a year not enough for widow to keep her home
• Jerry Sandusky rearrested in Pennsylvania
• Blagojevich sentenced to 14 years in prison