In the early 1960s, the Royal Netherlands Navy had an urgent requirement to replace its Van Amstel-class frigates, obsolete ex-American escorts built during the Second World War.

To meet this requirement, it chose to build a modified version of the British Leander-class frigate as its Van Speijk class, using broadly the same armament as the original design, but where possible, substituting Dutch electronics and radars.

[4] The 4.5-inch gun was replaced by a single OTO Melara 76 mm and launchers for up to eight Harpoon anti-ship missiles fitted (although only two were normally carried).

The hangar and flight deck were enlarged, allowing a Westland Lynx helicopter to be carried, while the Limbo mortar was removed, with a pair of triple Mk 32 torpedo launchers providing close-in anti-submarine armament.

[5][9] In 1969 she attended a naval review at Spithead together with the destroyers Zeeland, Holland and Noord-Brabant, the cruiser De Ruyter and the frigate Van Nes.

The completion of modernization was delayed by around eight months from intended due to lack of civilian labor in naval dockyards.

[1] The ship was transferred to Indonesia on 1 November 1989 and renamed as KRI Abdul Halim Perdanakusuma, assigned with pennant number 355.

[12] In 2011, Abdul Halim Perdanakusuma along with Yos Sudarso and Banjarmasin were dispatched to Somalian waters as a task force responding to the hijacking of cargo ship MV Sinar Kudus by Somali pirates.