From Steel Tracks to War Tracks: How China Builds Subways and Provide Aid in Gaza While the U.S. Builds Militarism and Destruction
- 小轩 李
- 3 days ago
- 9 min read
By Lee Siu Hin (China-US Solidarity Network) & Kening Zhang | August 31, 2025
While both the U.S. and China face immense challenges in governing vast nations and maintaining complex infrastructure, the outcomes and priorities they exhibit are strikingly different. The following is a first-person account by Mr. Lee Siu Hin, compiled and edited by Kening Zhang.
Every time I take a flight from Shanghai to Los Angeles, or Urumqi to New York, what gives me the biggest shock is the comparison between the filthy, unsafe, and inefficient New York subway system and the more modern, cleaner, and safer Chinese metro systems in Shanghai and Urumqi.
According to the New York City Council, the New York subway’s operating budget is $10.79 billion for 2025. The system has 665 miles (1,070 km) of track, which means approximately $16.2 million is spent on each mile of subway track ($10.1 million/km) annually. According to Chinese media reports, the operating budget of the Shanghai Metro in 2024 was approximately $73 million for 557 miles (896 km), or approximately $131,100 per track mile ($81,400/km). The average operational cost per mile for the NY subway is over 120 times that of the Shanghai Metro. Even the NYPD’s 2025 budget of $5.75 billion for subway security is a whopping 7.88 times the entire annual budget of the Shanghai Metro.
Even though the NY subway system allocates disproportionately large sums of money for security, there were still 10 murders in the subway in 2024, according to the NYPD. There were also at least 30 hate crimes against Asian Americans on the NY subways in 2021, and a hate killing of a Chinese woman in a subway station in January 2022. Violent crimes in the Chinese subway system are virtually unheard of.
Because I fear for my safety, I never stand near the edge of the subway platform and always choose to ride in the car where the conductor is located. Public transportation is considered one of the most important services a city offers and one that should have the public’s trust in the government, since everyone needs to use it for work or travel.
A city should provide a reliable, safe, and clean metro or bus system for everyone to improve quality of life, save commuting time and money, and reduce their carbon footprint. This stark contrast in safety outcomes reveals the institutional logic behind resource allocation: where capital interests consistently outweigh public safety investments, and where the military-industrial complex diverts funds meant for people's livelihoods. Even massive security expenditures cannot conceal systemic failure.
Infrastructure: China vs. the U.S.
This stark contrast in public transportation reflects a broader divergence in national priorities between China and the United States.
It's not only Shanghai that is a showcase of China’s urban development. Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang in the Uyghur Autonomous Region in western China, is also a city with well-developed infrastructure and a clean and safe subway system. It is completely different from the image painted in the hostile, anti-China narratives of the U.S. and the West. Their image is that Xinjiang is an open-air concentration camp with horrific genocide. The truth is, Urumqi is cleaner, safer, and more developed, and enjoys greater ethnic harmony than New York City.
The reality of Urumqi, with its modern infrastructure and visible development, presents a direct challenge to the prevailing narrative in some Western media. New York exemplifies the U.S.’s infrastructure failures, reflecting systemic inefficiency, waste, and corruption. In contrast, the Chinese government is people-centered and emphasizes efficient public service. While China is not free from corruption or bureaucratic inefficiency, it nevertheless demonstrates greater effectiveness in serving its citizens compared with the U.S.
A good example is MacArthur Park, a low-income immigrant community west of downtown Los Angeles, where we have organized many activist projects in the past. For the last 35 years, except for the construction of a new LA Metro line and a few new and expensive commercial buildings and condos, it has seen little change and, in many ways, has deteriorated because the surrounding buildings and community are also deteriorating. Last July, ICE immigration police and the military made a sweep through the MacArthur Park area, creating fear and insecurity in the community. On the other hand, in Shanghai’s Huaihai Road district, over the past 30 years, many old neighborhoods have been rebuilt or refurbished, making it more livable and transforming it into an attractive commercial center.
The U.S. has a capitalist-centered economy, so everything is geared to maximizing corporate profits as the ultimate goal, and subsidizing the military-industrial complex and fueling endless bloody wars around the world has effectively become part of the U.S.’s economic planning. According to the National Priorities Project, the actual U.S. military budget is $2,700 billion, equaling 50% of the entire U.S. government budget based on Trump’s Fiscal Year 2026 proposal. It is larger than the military budgets of the next four largest defense budgets (China, Russia, Germany, and India) combined.
The question arises: how is this funding allocated?
It is used for mass surveillance, targeting inner-city immigrant communities of color, and providing weapons to far-right Ukrainian forces and the Israeli military in operations that result in civilian casualties, including children, around the world. As a result, the U.S. lacks the financial, technical, and human resources to rebuild its aging infrastructure and industrial base.
In contrast, there is the success of China’s countless infrastructure projects over the past several decades – not only the gigantic power stations, hydroelectric dams, and intercity high-speed railroads, but also many other urban public projects that bring better living for everyone. These include clean and convenient subway systems, affordable housing for the poor, jobs with living wages, crime- and hate-free communities, rural development, and green technologies for better environments for everyone.
It's not just that the U.S. can’t and China can, but rather it is the fundamental difference between the Chinese government prioritizing people’s needs, while the U.S. makes corporate greed its ultimate goal.
How Racism Continues to Shape U.S. Policy
It doesn’t mean there have been no new developments in New York or Los Angeles for the past 30 years. It does indicate that these developments have mainly happened in the wealthy white neighborhoods at the expense of the poor people of color who are their neighbors. This process is called “gentrification”, the displacement of lower-income communities by wealthier residents. A good example is the South Bronx neighborhood in New York City, where a mixed low-income African-American and immigrant community will soon be filled with expensive apartments. This type of development will affect nearby property values, causing rental prices to shoot up. The future of the South Bronx will no longer be a haven for immigrant communities.
The U.S. anti-communist capitalist elite, who have driven gentrification in pursuit of profit, often with racialized impacts, cannot accept that China is spending massive resources to build infrastructure to benefit its low-income and ethnic communities; therefore, they are promoting claims of “genocide” against China in an attempt to undermine the significance of the development occurring in Xinjiang.
Most ordinary Americans have never been to China, but they have been traumatized by the negative experience of racist gentrification across their own country. Therefore, they will find it difficult to understand that China’s massive urban development in Xinjiang’s Urumqi and Kashgar is greatly improving living standards, benefiting local economies, and strengthening multi-ethnic unity.
The ultimate goal for the U.S. anti-communist and anti-China groups is to split Xinjiang off from China and make it into a war-torn, terrorist warlord haven like Syria. U.S. imperialists have consistently prioritized the wealthy at the expense of the poor, and are now channeling resources and support to Israel, enabling its ongoing bombardment and displacement of Palestinians in Gaza.
Aid to Gaza: U.S. Hypocrisy vs. China’s Genuine Commitment
On the surface, the U.S. appears to be one of the largest donors to Gaza, providing $635 million to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) in 2024. However, a significant portion of the funds has been used to pay high salaries to international staff at humanitarian agencies that oversee what the U.S. and Israel refer to as Gaza “humanitarian operations.” It has also spent millions of dollars coordinating costly airdrop operations with other countries, some of which tragically resulted in civilian casualties in Gaza, or building a floating pier in Gaza (which failed within days of construction) to help Israel keep any genuine humanitarian agencies from sending aid over land to Gaza from Egypt, the easiest and most efficient route for getting aid in.
Even more cynically, a large part of the U.S. Gaza “humanitarian” funding is now being spent to hire former Israeli Mossad members to create the so-called Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). The U.S. thereby blocks genuine international humanitarian agencies from operating in Gaza, instead hiring private contractors to assist the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF). This support enables the IOF to perpetrate what constitutes femicide and ethnic cleansing. Between May 27 and July 31, 2025, the IOF killed at least 1,373 Palestinians who were trying to get food aid – 859 were killed in the vicinity of the GHF food distribution sites and 514 others were killed along the routes taken by the food convoys, according to the United Nations.
This is not spending money for “humanitarian aid.” Instead, it is U.S. investment in sustaining Israel’s occupation and policies of mass violence in Gaza.
Aid to Gaza from China and other countries of the Global South takes a human-centered approach. While China donated $2 million to the UN agencies in 2024, far less than the U.S., China’s aid didn’t go to help with genocide. Gaza’s aid system is not broken; rather, it functions precisely as intended by the U.S. There are many Chinese grassroots movements sending aid to Gaza. For example, my friend Yousef, a Gazan who escaped to China with help from his Chinese friends, has organized a family-run humanitarian project to feed people, with help from his mother, who is still in Gaza. Our organization, Panda Aid, is working with Palestinian humanitarian organizations to send medical aid and donated funds to support food kitchens in Gaza.
These are efforts by Chinese community activists to support the people of Gaza. Meanwhile, the U.S. is diverting resources away from its own communities at home to fund racist campaigns and Israel's genocide in Gaza, all while baselessly defaming China's infrastructure projects and development initiatives in Xinjiang.
In fact, the New York Subway is worse than the subway systems of many other cities, including Cairo, Istanbul, and Bangkok.
There’s no doubt that, as the saying goes, “the U.S. bombs, China builds.” That's why America's infrastructure is crumbling and never gets rebuilt; the money is funneled into other priorities. This isn't an accident—it's by design.
It is not that Trump single-handedly ushered in the racist MAGA movement; rather, long-standing structural racism and authoritarian tendencies within the U.S. system created the conditions for its rise.
About Lee Siu Hin
Lee Siu Hin is a Chinese American immigrant rights activist born in Hong Kong, China, and from Los Angeles, California, USA. He is the founder of the China-US Solidarity Network (CUSN), the National Immigrant Solidarity Network (NISN), and Panda Aid. He is a long-term organizer in community, labor, anti-war, and immigrant rights activities, committed to grassroots struggles. He was also a long-term unpaid reporter, producer, and war correspondent for Pacifica Radio KPFK in Los Angeles, and has worked in war zones in the Middle East, Europe, and Africa. He travels frequently between China and the U.S. to build the China-U.S. activist international solidarity movement.
Appendix
New York City Council Committee on Transportation & Infrastructure, Report on the Calendar Year 2025. Adopted Budget and the 2025-2028 Financial Plan of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, https://council.nyc.gov/budget/wp-content/uploads/sites/54/2025/03/Metropolitan-Transportation-Authority.pdf
New York City Subway Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Subway#:~:text=The%20system%20is%20also%20one,)%20including%20non%2Drevenue%20trackage.
Shanghai Metro, Baidu https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E4%B8%8A%E6%B5%B7%E5%9C%B0%E9%93%81/1273732
Revenue and profit rankings of 28 subway companies have been released. Track Culture, May 16, 2025 https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=MzIwNjg0MDIzMg==&mid=2247579703&idx=2&sn=a02a4dbb63a1697a2a698f38723b2d93&chksm=96585d20ebcf1cbc0721116de352e468faf5ab9b29f972b6b8ab3dcbbe21d9f77d4f803ae75f&scene=27
Shentong Metro's revenue in 2024 was 586 million yuan, up by 45.89% compared to the previous year. Its net profit was 51.8186 million yuan, down by 24.94% year-on-year. The gross profit margin decreased by 2.20 percentage points. Sina Finance, March 27, 2025 https://baijiahao.baidu.com/s?id=1827745466045792228&wfr=spider&for=pc
Are N.Y.C. Subways Dangerous? What the Statistics Show After Recent High-Profile Attacks, Ben Brachfeld, People, January 6, 2025, https://people.com/subway-crime-statistics-show-incidents-down-despite-high-profile-incidents-8769805
2021 Saw Another Surge of Anti-Asian Hate Crimes in Subway, Jose Martinez, The City, January 4, 2022, https://www.thecity.nyc/2022/01/04/2021-saw-another-surge-of-anti-asian-hate-crimes-in-subway/
Subway Killing Shocks Asian Americans Coast to Coast, Rafu Shimpo, January 20, 2022 https://rafu.com/2022/01/subway-killing-shocks-asian-americans-coast-to-coast/
Ranked: Top 15 Countries by Military Budgets in 2025, Pallavi Rao, Graphics/Design: Lebon Siu, Anna Diederichs; Visual Capitalists June 27, 2025, https://www.visualcapitalist.com/ranked-top-15-countries-by-military-budgets-in-2025/
Where Your Income Tax Money Really Goes FY2026, National Priorities Project, https://www.warresisters.org/store/where-your-income-tax-money-really-goes-fy2026/
The gentrification and luxury takeover of the South Bronx waterfront, Ed García Conde, Welcome2theBronx; September 29, 2021, https://www.welcome2thebronx.com/2021/09/the-gentrification-and-luxury-takeover-of-the-south-bronx-waterfront/
Fund people’s needs in the Bronx, not genocide in Gaza! Ché Marino, Workers World, January 25, 2024, https://www.workers.org/2024/01/76536/
Occupied Palestinian Territory 2024, OCHA Financial Tracking Service; OCHA, https://fts.unocha.org/countries/171/donors/2024
At least 5 Gazans crushed to death by botched US aid airdrops, Palestinians report, Einav Halabi, Elisha Ben Kimon, Ynet News; March 9, 2024, https://www.ynetnews.com/article/s1qda0u6t
Airdropped Aid Is Crushing Starving People in Gaza, Taqwa Ahmed Al-Wawi, The Intercept, August 22, 2025, https://theintercept.com/2025/08/22/gaza-aid-airdrops/
Israeli Mossad named as funder of Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, Max Blumenthal and Wyatt Reed, The Grayzone; May 29, 2025, https://thegrayzone.com/2025/05/29/israeli-mossad-gaza-humanitarian-foundation-aid/
Gaza: Nearly 1,400 Palestinians killed while seeking food, as UN warns airdrops are no solution; United Nations, August 1, 2025, https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/08/1165552
Gaza’s aid system isn’t broken. It’s working exactly as designed; Ahmad Ibsais, Al-Jazeera, May 28, 2025, https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2025/5/28/gazas-aid-system-isnt-broken-its-working-exactly-as-designed
Insan Sebil Slam (ISS)-Panda Aid Gaza Joint-Project Promotional Video (English Caption), Panda Aid; July 14, 2025, https://www.palestinewatch.net/post/insan-sebil-slam-iss-panda-aid-gaza-joint-project-promotional-video-english-caption
How blood-stained West orchestrated ‘genocide’ defamation against Xinjiang step by step; Liu Xin, Fan Lingzhi and Xie Wenting, Global Times, June 08, 2021, https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202106/1225747.shtml
U.S. bombs, China builds; Sharon Black, Struggle-La Lucha; June 28, 2025 https://www.struggle-la-lucha.org/2025/06/28/u-s-bombs-china-builds/