But I will concede this: Due to the opaque nature of the Chinese economy to public scrutiny, we might never know.
I am sure, however that substantial use of Chinese inference (not their models per se, but on their servers) is, in aggregate, presents a substantial national security risk for the West. Heck, AI all by itself, without even considering other nations, is a national security threat of the near future, where national security is broadly construed as any threat against its people's welfare, no matter the actor.
Maybe not in the US (although Musk getting state subsidies comes to mind), but very common in Europe. Quite a few founder friends of mine have gotten started with state funding (through various R&D promoting agencies). Angel investing is not the only startup funding structure out there