Ionizing radiation damages pretty much everything, so there's no doubt in my mind that it would increase cancer risk some, but again, everything I'm finding is anecdotal.

SO, yeah, i'm definitely not doubting that radiation exposure increases cancer risk, just that the effects I stated are far more prevalent. In fact your own source shows an increase in leukemia, but also cites the tens of thousands that died from acute exposure, a number which is certainly greater than those who later died of cancer.

Also the ALARA principle is referring to things like X-rays, CT scans as well as radiation workers working with radioactive isotopes. It is NOT referring to individual heavy exposure events that stirred this conversation. Also, hilariously enough, the we keep the dose As Low A Reasonable Achievable rather than having some threshold due to the LACK OF EVIDENCE combined with the cautionary principle. We know that it probably does increase cancer risk, but the effects are too small to have been objectively measured yet.

Also your Nagasaki Hiroshima example is the epitome of anecdotal evidence. While for me personally and for most people can have no doubt in our minds that radiation played a major role, the way the data has been gathered any number of common factors between their shared experience. If you dont understand why, imagine a hurricane hitting some major city, then food is given out as a part of relief which is contaminated with a compound to later be discovered as a mutagen and never recorded to have been in teh relief food. They would have a higher incidence of cancer and people would point and say: "Look, hurricanes cause cancer!" and the data would appear to show that, which is why little weight is held on anecdotal studies.

All of which is irrelevant to my initial point, that most people who die from acute exposure die within weeks from effects that are completely unrelated to cancer. The people who get cancer later often get it much later in life, when people typically get cancer anyway, so its hard to objectively attribute that to the large exposure event. You've never one hit on my initial point that the much larger issue are the various types of "radiation sickness" rather than cancer.