In situations like this it always should come down to the specifications and the terms of contract. If the specs said 'code must be in 'c' then you're obliged to deliver in 'c'. If there was no such requirement - then they'll just have to suffer.

Nevertheless, finding skilled assembler programmers (actually skilled programmers full stop) is becoming harder these days. The requirement for being able to program in assembler is diminishing and I find myself rarely programming in assembler these days. Such is the march of technology. The requirement for people to speak ancient Greek has also diminished over the ages!

Mike Stegmaier - you have a myopic view of reality. Most military and aerospace projects have used high (or higher) level languages since the 70's. Writing defect free assembler code is difficult. Writing defect free code in any language is difficult, but with high level languages (I include c here for the discussion) you have tools that can scan for a lot of common defects. You can also get validated compilers. Studies have proven it is more productive and less error prone to use higher level languages rather than assembler. It would be extremely unwise to undertake a large project in assembler - just think if Linux or Windows was written in assembler? Using the same argument, the 'c' compilers must be pretty defect free as if there were defects, think how such large projects would even execute? Taking your stance to the next level - why not program in microcode or hard code the algorithm in logic for a state machine to execute?