diff -r 4a55b98314cd Lib/tarfile.py
--- a/Lib/tarfile.py	Mon Jan 12 21:03:41 2015 +0100
+++ b/Lib/tarfile.py	Tue Jan 13 09:55:40 2015 +0100
@@ -2177,6 +2177,10 @@
         try:
             # For systems that support symbolic and hard links.
             if tarinfo.issym():
+                # a symlink with that name exists already, we need to replace
+                # it with our version (see #37688)
+                if os.path.lexists(targetpath):
+                    os.remove(targetpath)
                 os.symlink(tarinfo.linkname, targetpath)
             else:
                 # See extract().