What sort of information do we have about the after effects of U.S. nuclear testing on the soldiers who were placed close to the blasts?

by witch_trial

Came across this 1950s video of soldiers being stuck into trenches near the blast. I've seen this sort of thing before, but I haven't found out a lot about the effects on the soldiers themselves. Were they effected by the radiation or were they indeed far enough away to walk away unscathed?

lsduh

My history teacher's father was around for a lot of the training and testing, and while she said he never spoke about it much, he died fairly young from cancer, with no history of cancer in the family.